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An Enugu based pastor, Gabriel Obiano (Gabriel Ooc), has emerged winner of 2019 Monster Hit Story Contest. The competition is an initiative of Ororo Pattaya 20km and David Jones, who is known for his Anti-Drug Advocacy among Nigerian Youth.

The contest, which ran on Instagram and Facebook between April and May, was designed for Nigerian youths on social media to share true-life story that borders on any life changing experiences on drug and substance abuse.

Report of a survey conducted by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), in collaboration with the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), revealed that the rate of drug abuse in Nigeria in 2018 was more than twice the global average of 5.3%.

According to the report, 14.3 million Nigerians are involved in abuse of drugs such as marijuana, opioids and cough syrup. The report further showed that those involved in abuse of such drugs are mainly between age 15 and 64, while one in every four of them is a woman.

Obiano’s story titled “How I Lost My Girlfriend To Drug Abuse” was a revelation on the disturbing trend of drug abuse and addiction among Nigerian women.

The Port Harcourt based pastor narrated how he met Esther and later proposed to her, only to discover she was a drug addict who has gone as far as using cocaine.

“I met Esther in God’s Word Outreach Ministry, in Port Harcourt. As a young preacher who was willing to settle down as of that moment after my Bible School. I picked interest in her. We started dating and finally I proposed to her. She accepted the proposal. Meanwhile she told me how the father abandoned her and her mom at her early stage of life. She told me, she can’t give account of where the dad is now. Due to hard life; she(Esther) left her mom too and moved to Port Harcourt.

“I felt her pain and advised her to make out time to visit her mom and know how she was doing and find out if she is aware of her dad’s whereabouts. She turned the advice down.

“She was seeing male friends who were in the military and some cultists who live a thug life. I was not aware of this until I was desperate to find out what she was doing with her time.

“On a Thursday, I visited her, coming close to her she was drunk and also offered me some drinks(I am not a drinking type). The drink she offered me was missed with “Tramadol”, sitting in her apartment I saw some used ” tramadol”: as at that time I never knew it was a hard drug. I thought she was just taking medicine.

“The next day she sat beside me and told me plainly she has been using hard drugs and most especially cocaine. I doubted her: “you can’t get cocaine in Nigeria” I said. She laughed and replied in a gentle voice as she whispered into my ear, “I get them from the barracks, I have a couple of military friends who use them.”

Obiano, explained that despite his many efforts to help Esther retract her wayward steps, she ended the relationship citing the sharp contrast in their lifestyle.

“The more I talk about it or try to change her mind, the more she began to hate me. She detests me because I was not buying her lifestyle. She stopped picking my calls. She started avoiding me. She stopped coming to church.

“One day, I decided to visit her after calling her several times. When I reached her door post, I was hearing noise inside, what I saw that day destroyed my mind. I was heartbroken that my mind was not right anymore. At the door post I sighted her getting high with friends, male and female.

I was discouraged to enter before I will be afflicted. I stepped outside and tried calling her, she came out and said: ” what are you doing here, I have told you I don’t want you anymore. It’s over.

At this moment she brought out my engagement ring from her room not even in her finger anymore and threw it at me. “We have no lifestyle in common, leave me to live my life the way I want.”

Obiano’s story attracted 377 likes, and 849 comments on Instagram, making a total of 1,226 votes to emerge winner of the contest.

Traction records revealed that the contest enjoyed good followership from social media users across Facebook and Instagram. The competition attracted 42 entries.  A total of 5,700 likes, 2,900 comments, 4,200 views, and 48,000 impressions were recorded on Instagram entries.