REVEREND Father Anselm Adodo is a monk of the Saint Benedict Monastery, Ewu in Edo State who has spent the last 10 years or so in intensive research into the medicinal uses of plants, and disseminates the knowledge through publications, seminars and workshops. Apart from basic courses in theology and philosophy, he studied anthropology and sociology, specialising in medical sociology and, today, he is the director of the monastery's PAX Herbal Clinic.

The dark complexioned cleric, who joined the monastery 20 years ago, hails from Akure in Ondo State. For those who don't know already, a monastery is a place set apart from the world of action, where people can devote more time for prayer, meditation and reflection while a monk is a member of other Christians who are leaving a life of prayers in a monastery. It is an official order in the Catholic Church. He did not join the monastery as a native doctor or a herbalist neither did he inherit the trait from his parents. But, some 12 years ago, he became interested in what plants around us can do and, like most hobbies, the urge started growing, so he started under a wooden hut trying to prepare some little drugs by himself and soon other brothers joined him.

As people from outside the monastery started using the drugs, they went out to spread the gospel of their efficacy and that was how it all started with the sole aim of helping the poor people of Ewu community. Many of the villagers often visited the monastery for medical help when they are sick and the monks then decided to do what they could to help them.

The original idea was to teach the community people how to mix herbs but some of the villagers were not too keen on that vocation, instead they preferred to get the finished drugs. And over the years, the monks put emphasis on research and not just to treat as the local people do. They believed and still do in finding out why the herbs work and, to do that, they require the assistance of everybody--the botanist, zanonary, microbiologist, biochemist. They have brought all of them together and even medical doctors. It is their desire to bridge the gap between the orthodox and the traditional and forge a synergy.

But, by far, the paramount desire of the revolutionary herbalist cleric is the ambition to reposition Africa as the pivotal continent as against the third world status currently allotted to it. "I believe that the greatest problem of Africa today is poverty of the mind. People are poor because they have not learnt to discover within themselves what they can do to help themselves. We squander 99 per cent of our potentials and we cry and die while others laugh at us," he said, adding: "Africa, from the beginning, is the first world. Civilisation started here, but now, it is the other way round.

"But we can change it. We can regain our lost position by going back within ourselves. Other countries who have made it today are those who looked inwards to develop their potentials. That is really my interest and not just a matter of selling herbal medicine".

Asked to speak on the number of products the herbal clinic has produced thus far, he said: "We have 62 products. Out of that number, some are specialised drugs that are not meant for the open shelf. Like cancer patients, for example. We can't prepare cancer drugs and send out. The patients come here and we decide how to combine to give to them. So, it is not all drugs that can be sent out to the shelf. We have about 32 products that can be sold anywhere and of that number we registered 15 with NAFDAC last year. We plan to register 20 more this year to bring the number to 35. Our drugs are unique in the sense that everything is done here. We follow that natural procedure, no chemical additives and no preservatives. It requires a lot of work to get the raw materials.

Registration of the drugs at NAFDAC

The experience is that, as an individual or a poor man in the village, a family may not be able to pass through the NAFDAC registration procedure. It is quite expensive even though on paper, when you see the little figures that they present, it may look quite easy. It took us four years of intense labour and devotion. I am concerned for the poor, talented traditional healers who will not be able to afford the registration procedure. For the bigger organisations and companies, it is quite easy in the sense that they have all the modern apparatus to go through the process. We learnt from experience. We started from the scratch and became an example of a truly local set-up. So, the experience is very challenging and requires a lot of hard work, but it is still quite expensive and does not encourage the individual.

It wasn't easy for us even as a body. So, you can imagine an individual or a family. It is quite difficult.

Fake products

We have heard that in some parts of Aba and Onitsha, people have seen some products that were really ours. They brought samples here some years ago and we found out that they are not our products. Right now, it is not a big problem, but I suppose it could become bigger as more people get to know about us.

Mode of distributing drugs

We have formed a distribution network all over Nigeria. All our distributors are registered, trained and belong to one of the four distribution zones. You must belong to a zone where a co-ordinator monitors the activities of all distributors. We are trying to co-ordinate the activities of our distributors and after we have done that we will leave the rest to God, so that we do not spend all our time running after people. We are trying to make sure that our distributors are well trained and know them sufficiently enough to reduce the risk of piracy.

Origin of the name Pax Herbal Centre

Pax is a Latin word meaning peace. The Benedictine order we belong to focuses on the aim of every monk when you join the monastery and that is to find peace and I think the aim of everybody is to find peace. We want peace of mind, peace of heart and that is the motto and the environment of any monastery so that when you get there the first thing that will strike you is an atmosphere of peace and calmness. That external peace should just be a reflection of the one within. So Pax is our motto and it means peace.

Cure for some of these deadly diseases through injections

Our policy is that we do not make claims in the sense that we don't tell people if you have cancer, come we will cure you. When people come here, we ask them about their problems and after explaining to us we direct on what to do. If they need to go for check-up, they will go, if they need to see a doctor to look after an aspect of their sickness, they will go and they need to see a counsellor, we refer them. We do the aspect that we know we can do in a way that will favour the patient. We prefer that approach than to tell people to come, that we can cure you of cancer or hypertension. If somebody comes, complaining of cancer, we find out all the details before attending to him and the testimonies should be able to speak for themselves. We keep records of the treatments we do here. In the last two years, we have kept the records of all the patients who have come here, the drugs they took, how they responded and how many of them are still alive or have gone to the great beyond and what happened. We have all the records to show to the people and we prefer the records to do the talking. We just want to do what we can to help people. Injections? No! We don't give injections. I don't know if there are herbal injections.

Testimonies

One of the staffers here, a 17-year old lady, was given three months to live in hospital. There was nothing much that needed to be done and it took us about five months and she has been well for the past seven years. She is in school now. There are many others and we have the record of every patient that comes here and the records do the talking for us.

Preservation of the herbs

Preservation is always a problem in herbal medicine but our microbiology section focuses on that. Last year, I travelled round the world trying to find a solution or the secret of preserving herbal drugs for four or five years and they told me that so long as it is in liquid and natural, that it is not possible. You can aim at one year but not more than that unless you preserve them by adding chemicals. The way out is to produce drugs in powder form or in capsules and that is in the main what we are doing. In the last one year, we have been converting our liquid drugs into tea bags and capsules with the hope of keeping them for at least four years without fear. For the liquid, you can use a lot of alcohol such as ogogoro, local gin but many people do not like taking such stuff. That's one of the reasons we are converting our drugs to some acceptable forms. Our botanical gardens are everywhere but we have about 40 vendors who supply us our raw materials such as mango backs, ca shew leaves, alloy vera and others.

Challenges

We have the challenge of keeping the standards. The temptation is always there, when the demand is increasing; instead of adding one bucket, you will be tempted to add two or three buckets of water to increase the quantity to gain more. That is a big challenge to maintain the standard and quality of our products no matter what it would cost. We made it clear to our staff who occasionally attend workshops and seminars on how not to cut corners and compromise our quality. We also have the challenge of trying to make the drugs available to everybody irrespective of social status.

Colour therapy

Colour therapy is one of the many therapies we have. We colour water, magnet, urine and many more. Colour therapy is simply our own way of making use of colours for our benefit. There is a course now in European universities by that name. But Africa is where you see colour and we should tap that knowledge for our own good. That is what we have done--to make it more modern and scientific and explain it medically on how to tap the radiation from the sun and use same for our own benefit.

Catholic Church's involvement in the project

The Catholic Church, from the beginning, has always been in the support of anything that will improve the culture of the people provided it is not against the teachings of Christ. The Church frowns at any aspect of Satanism, but to promote the good elements of culture. The Church is happy that we are letting people see the good works. The last Pope actually mentioned this place in one of his tours as an example of how people should promote the good qualities of the local culture.

Relationship with orthodox medical practitioners

We have been working together and the relationship has been cordial. When medical doctors criticise herbal medicine, it is not really that they are against it; it is the old method of manufacturing them that scares them and they want to be sure of what they take. Once you are sure of the source, there won't be much problem. Many of our patients are medical doctors and they are happy they have been using our products. We are the only body that has that outreach to different group of people and they feel at home when they come here.