Monkey Tail, a Date-Rape Drug in Nigeria
“Monkey Tail,” is an unlikely-sounding moniker. It is a drink made of ogogoro (local gin) left to brew in igbo (marijuana leaves, stems, roots or seeds). Well, for a few days or more, producing varying units of intoxication (UOI) for the user.
The beverage gives users two different but simultaneous “highs” with unpredictable outcomes. More so, for a novice and depending on the alcoholic content, igbo potency, and amount consumed. There is also the case of synergy where, for example, ten UOI of ogogoro plus ten UOI of igbo can cause thirty-seven UOI when consumed.
Today, Nigerians see Monkey Tail as a popular masculine drink. We believe street boys abuse it recklessly. May be as a source of Dutch courage and ‘escape’ from the trials of street life. While at the higher echelons of the social structure, gentlemen are most likely to drink it responsibly and some for sexual purposes. They would perceive women who drink Monkey Tail as wayward or unwomanly.
We could uncover that Monkey Tail throughout the 1980s and 1990s was a common ‘date-rape’ drug in Nigeria. At tertiary institutions of learning or in towns, young men throw the parties often serve Monkey Tail variants as “punch”. Similar to the punch cocktails, the variant in question is a concoction of Monkey Tail (primary ingredient). Added are other spirits, dessert wines, Ribena, bits/slices of fruit and sometimes Guinness or palm-wine. They introduced sweeteners and other additives to mask the sickly taste of marijuana. Some desperate guys even added barbiturates.
At the parties, small and intimate, called “mellows”, they would serve decent food to all the girls with the fruity and delicious “punch” before any male. The girls loved the punch, especially when ice was available. The unwitting girls were having a good time for all they cared. Then the dancing would start. Within an hour, one could observe all the social inhibitions of the girls had fallen flat with them laughing at each other’s antics. Not too long after that, they would pass out.
Whatever happened to those girls often remains a secret to this day. Still, one source who spoke to us on condition of anonymity confessed that the primary purpose and outcome of the parties was rape. They had a lot of compromising photos of naked girls or engaged in sex with a guy whose face they could not see while theirs was. Many of these girls ended up suffering blackmail for money and sex by the party throwers. They claimed they forced many thousands of girls into part prostitution because of the ensuing blackmail.
The source volunteered the information to us after confessing his sins to an undisclosed church congregation. Monkey Tail is a date rape drug he discovered by accident. He had given it to two girls who visited him on their insistence at his one-room apartment in Benin-City while he was a teacher there in 1979. He had sex with the girls as they had become unconscious and he spread the word.
It was to become a scheme he and his friends exacted for several years on women with increasing sophistication, especially while he was an undergraduate. He also possessed many compromising photos of naked women. Today, he claims to be repentant and regrets his actions.
Monkey Tail has undoubtedly had a silent but evil history. What do men use it for these days?
Grimot Nane