National Tobacco Control Bill - MAN vs. Tobacco Lobbyists

MAN warns over Anti-Tobacco Bill -says action will affect country’s GDP

The rank of those calling for caution by the Senate in the treatment of the anti-tobacco bill, has been swelled by the apex manufacturing body, the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN).

...MAN BOSS

In making his call, the Chairman of MAN, South-West Zone (comprising Oyo, Osun, Ondo, Ekiti, Kwara and Kogi states), the tobacco-producing area of the country, Chief Isaac Adaegbo Akinpide, said that the tobacco bill currently at the Senate is geared towards killing tobacco production in the country.

Speaking with reporters he said: “MAN recognises the need to regulate the tobacco industry, but in doing this, government should be careful that it does not kill the legal industry. If the legal industry disappears, people will still smoke in this country so there will be a demand for tobacco products and the vacuum will be filled by smugglers.”

The MAN chairman also highlighted the economic import of the move, if it materialises in the Senate. He asserted, “over the past few years, approximately 50 per cent of the workforce in the nation’s manufacturing sector have been thrown out of jobs and in 2008, the manufacturing sub-sector’s contribution to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was a paltry 4.13 per cent down from 10 per cent which it stood at in the preceding years.”

He urged the Federal Governments to be more careful with its policies so as to protect local industries. “The tyre industry suffered the same fate with Michelin in Port Harcourt and Dunlop in Ikeja closing their factories. These developments can be attributable to dysfunctional government policies which do not take into consideration, the impact they will have on the economy,” he explained.

A couple of weeks ago, the Chairman, Senate Committee on Industries, Senator Kamorudeen Adedibu (PDP, Oyo South) in condemning the bill, stated that it is a ‘misplaced priority.’ Many other Nigerians have in different fora, advised that the Senate apply caution, even as it is a general consensus that the tobacco industry needs to be regulated. SOURCE

Tobacco Lobbyists and the National Tobacco Control Bill

-By Jakpor, a public health advocate, Lagos

It is becoming evident by the day that beneficiaries of the tobacco industry will stop at nothing to keep the tobacco business going even if it means distorting hard facts that have far-reaching implication on our well-being as a people.

Articles that have popped up in the media since news broke that the National Tobacco Control Bill 2009 received overwhelming support from members of the Senate did not only confirm this assertion but also deepened my conviction that indeed the bill is coming at a very auspicious time.

It is coming at a time that independent findings by well-meaning and concerned organisations, including a recent one by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) confirmed that like no other time in history, tobacco companies are aggressively marketing cigarettes to children across Africa and conscripting them into smoking through parties and deceptive concepts.

Here in Nigeria, the successful campaigns to bring down tobacco billboards and halt advertisement on set notwithstanding, tobacco firms have always conned their way around the law. British America Tobacco (BAT) –the market leader here, has been successfully replaced TV, newspaper and radio adverts with indirect adverts –branding of T-shirts, kiosks and vehicles in its colors and logo. The company also recently owned up to organizing secret smoking parties with an unstated mission: To recruit the swarm of underage that are deluded into believing that smoking is “hype” and “classy”.

It was on this foundation that the National Tobacco Control Bill, sponsored by Senate Deputy Minority Leader, Olorunnimbe Mamora, makes it an offence to sell or market tobacco products to persons under the age of 18 and imposes a fine not exceeding N50,000 or imprisonment of a term not exceeding six months or both on violators. It also prohibits all advertisements, sponsorships, testimonials and promotion of cigarettes in the country.

In the week since the Senate threw its weight behind the bill, I have glossed over the water-less arguments of the tobacco foot soldiers trying to hack away at provisions in the bill until I stumbled on an amazing report that prompted me to put pen to paper.

In the widely published report, Chairman, South-West Zone of the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria, Chief Isaac Adaegbo Akinpide was quoted: “MAN recognizes the need to regulate the tobacco industry, but in doing this, government should be careful that it does not kill the legal industry. If the legal industry disappears, people will still smoke in this country so there will be a demand for tobacco products and the vacuum will be filled by smugglers.”

While I may not want to believe that the view of the MAN chief represents all MAN member groups (even in his South West), this shocking statement at a time Nigerians are counting the cost of the health impacts of tobacco is very disappointing.

For one, his argument on economic and job losses that will worsen the approximately retrenched 50 per cent of workforce in the nation’s manufacturing sector since 2008 does not have any bearing with the issues at stake: increasing number of deaths due to tobacco and the need to rein in on this development through stiff laws like obtains in other parts of the world.

Time and again, MAN as a body has blamed the parlous state of the manufacturing sector on inconsistency in government policies and divided interest. What inconsistency is more than a government that on one hand promises to uphold the health of its citizens and on the other hand, welcomes a merchant of death? That is what the open arms that the Obasanjo administration gave to BAT in 2001 when it applauded a $150 million cigarette manufacturing plant in Ibadan represents. Since that time, more youths have taken to smoking and the rest of course is history.

The issue of smuggling is an insignificant one which Nigerians know too well: Cigarette smuggling can be laid on the doorsteps of the tobacco industry whose internal documents confirm is actually behind the booming smuggling business.

But then, an issue that is even more surprising that tobacco lobbyists avoid like a plague is that recommendations in the bill is not actually a novel innovation by our Senators. The World Health Orgnisation (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, which Nigeria signed on June 28, 2004 and ratified on October 20, 2005 recognizes the need for parties to the protocol to enact laws that will clip the wings of the tobacco firms.

WHO initiated the FCTC in 1999 in response to the global tobacco epidemic and it was subsequently endorsed unanimously by WHO member states on 21 May, 2003 to become a legally-binding international public health treaty. The WHO FCTC requires nations to implement a range of tobacco control policies including banning smoking in public places, raising taxes on tobacco products, banning tobacco advertising, and labeling cigarette packets with health warnings.

The Conference of Parties to the FCTC which met in Durban, South Africa last year with a strong delegation from the Nigerian government also strengthened Article 5.3 of the protocol which protects the treaty and related public health policies from tobacco industry interference and even prohibits government partnership or collaboration with the tobacco industry. Ever since, the slogan of the tobacco industry has been “revenue will be lost by governments”
Fortunately this argument did not sell in neighboring Ghana where, even before the COP3, because of the same antics they have been accused of in Nigeria, the Ghanian government delisted BAT from the Ghanian Stock Exchange and threw it out of that country.

The same deceptive arguments also did not hold in the United Kingdom and other countries of Europe that sent them packing after decades of operation.

It is safe to remind the few Nigerian beneficiaries buying up newspaper space to encourage the production and sale of a confirmed killer product that the same companies they front for admitted their crimes in the United States of America where they pay $206 billion to the coffers of 46 states annually in fines for their past, present and future death-inducing actions. This started in 1998 under what has come to be known as Master Settlement Agreement, and will continue for another 14 years.

Going by statistics from the WHO which puts tobacco-induced deaths at over 5.4 million annually (more than 75 per cent happening in developing nations), it becomes quite clear that proponents of a so-called foreign direct investment in form of tobacco products do not understand what pro-people investment really is.

One of the greatest producers and exporter of tobacco leaves is Malawi, a nation that is competing for permanent status in the list of poor nations in the World Poverty Index, Clearly, tobacco has not brought Malawi wealth and will not bring us wealth either.

If the production and marketing of tobacco products is actually the definition of what a foreign direct investment is, the Lagos State government for instance, will not be expending N216,000 annually on the 9,527 tobacco-related cases in 11 out of 26 public hospitals as revealed in a 2006 survey.

If it is actually an investment worth celebrating, tobacco growing communities in Iseyin and Ago Are in the same Oyo State which houses the $150 million so-called investment will not remain as backward and rustic as it was maybe in the time of the Late Bishop Ajayi Crowther of blessed memory.

Since 2001 when BAT commissioned a $150 million plant in Ibadan, Oyo State and upgraded its Zaria factory to produce 7,200 sticks per minute, the smoking rate among youths also assumed a frightening dimension.

In 1994, seven years before the commissioning of the Ibadan Plant, the smoking rate among youths was four per cent. The publicity blitz and deceptive marketing that followed the commissioning pushed the figures to 18.1 per cent among the age groups 13-15 years by the end of 2002.

Unfortunately, like most cancer patients dying gradually in the hospitals today, the unsuspecting youth will come to know years from now when they develop terminal ailments, that their future had been mortgaged by the organizers of the smoking parties.

We can easily dismember tobacco lobbyists’ position on the need to save the tobacco companies litigation and subsequent closing of shop in other to save the contentious 300,000 dependants of the alleged 2,500 tobacco industry staff that will be thrown into the unemployment market if the companies eventually does pack up.

One even wonders how those figures where manufactured when BATN recently revealed that less than a thousand Nigerians are in its direct employ because of the fully automated nature of the Ibadan plant. The thousands of tobacco farmers that may have been conscripted into the list of threatened workforce as Nigerians have come to know, are poor farmers who are only victims of a monopolistic company that has condemned them to irredeemable poverty.

Today, BAT is sole buyer of the farmers’ leaves, dictates ridiculous prices and supplies them fertilizers like a child tied to the umbilical cord of a mother. But unlike the later, this union is a torturously life-long.

Be that as it may, the fictitious 302,500 people can still not equate the many more thousands that die annually from cancer and other tobacco-related illnesses and many more that will die.
It will make more sense for tobacco lobbyists concentrate on getting their benefactor to diversify into other areas of agriculture that its foundation claims success in improving instead of the waste of newspaper space.

The National Tobacco Control Bill is an idea whose time has come and the Senate’s decision to fast-track the process of translating it into law is a fresh breath away from the stagnation and deliberate hurdles thrown the way of the multi-billion naira suits by the tobacco giants.

The patriotism of the honorable members of the House in standing for the rights of Nigerians to a poison-free air is commendable. Mamora and his team will have their names written in gold in the annals of this nation.


SOURCE

Group chides Adedibu over tobacco bill

A Non-Governmental Organisation, Journalists Action on Tobacco and Health (JATH) has criticized the Chairman, Senate Committee on Industries, Senator Kamoru Adedibu, over his statement that the passage of the national tobacco control bill into law will throw 400,000 people into the unemployment market.

The group said it was unfortunate that Adedibu, who represents Oyo South at the Senate, also promised to mobilise his colleagues to ensure that the bill was not passed.

In a statement issued by the group’s Programme Manager, Mr. Yinka Olugbade, it said it was not surprised that Adedibu described the bill as a “misplaced priority” for the country.

“We are not surprised he described the bill as a misplaced priority, after all, he was speaking at the 2008 Farmers’ Productivity Award ceremony organised by the British American Tobacco Nigeria and BAT, one of the tobacco giants whose businesses have caused the death of many, made many to be down with cancers and kill many as a result of second hand smoking. They endanger the lives of millions and profit only a few,” said the group.

The bill being sponsored by Senator Olorunimbe Mamora prohibits the sale of cigarettes to anyone less than 18 years and restricts the sale of cigarettes to 1,000 metres radius from schools, playgrounds and anywhere that young and under-age persons congregate.

Jath said this bill, which also seeks to abolish all forms of tobacco advertisement and promotions, sponsorships or endorsements; prohibits the sale of cigarette in sticks and forbids smoking in public places, will empower the government to recoup public funds spent on treating people who fall sick through using tobacco once it becomes law.

FOR TOBACCO GIANTS, THE NOOSE GETS TIGHTER

Efforts to domestic the World Health Organization (WHO's) Framework Convention on Tobacco receiving the blessing of the National Assembly,...

A CASE FOR THE ANTI TOBACCO BILL IN THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY

By - Seun Akioye

I happened to be at the public gallery of the Senate Chambers the day distinguished Senator Olorunnibe Mamora presented his historic anti-tobacco bill in the National Assembly. In his lead debate he made justifications on why the bill should be passed. One of such is the increasing and alarming rate at which young people take to smoking currently. He mentioned the fatality rate of two persons dying every day due to a tobacco related illness and which came to light during a recent survey in eleven Lagos hospitals.

Senator Mamoora, also noted that it takes an average of 20 years for the full impact of smoking to manifest and take its deadly toll and if the causalities that we see now are a result of past smoking habits one wonders what would become of our public health in 20 years time. He mentioned some of the goals of the bill which include; protection of the nation’s public health and protection of young people and others from inducement to use tobacco and tobacco related products by restricting access to tobacco.

Over ninety eight per cent of the Senators spoke in strong support of the bill. One is humbled by the level of awareness and commitment of the lawmakers to bestow public health legacy to the next generation. Infact, Senator Chimarooke Nnamani took time to lecture the senate on the dangers of smoking. The senate also noted that tobacco industry has the strongest lobbying team in the world and may want to jeopardize the bill. To forestall this possibility, Senate President David Mark, directed the Senate Committee on health to expedite action on the bill and return it to the chambers in two weeks. It is sad to know that the lobbying by the industry that the senate was so wary of has already started.

Writing in the Vanguard of February 18th 2009, one Tayo Olatoye exercised his fundamental rights to begin a campaign against the bill. First, I commend Olatoye for fully disclosing his identity. He is the Associate Consultant/Account Director, Quadrant Company. The Head Consultant, Quadrant, Bolaji Okusaga had in an earlier media interview revealed that the company is the main publicists for the British American Tobacco Company though he also admitted that “BAT account has been a bit challenging.” So we know who Olatoye speaks for.

That Olatoye merely regurgitate BAT lines is not surprising. What is worrying is his attack on Nigeria’s sovereignty. I also find it difficult that a Nigerian could publicly argue a legislation whose aim is to combat the health impacts of smoking.

Olatoye made a wobbly mention of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control(FCTC) and the Conference of the parties held in Durban in November. For clarity, the FCTC is an international treaty for the regulation of the manufacturing, marketing and distribution of tobacco products. The treaty was initiated by the World Health Assembly (WHA) in accordance with it’s mandate of promoting highest standard of health globally. The FCTC currently has 162 Parties including Nigeria. Nigeria signed the FCTC on June 28, 2004 and ratified on October 20, 2005. The treaty entered into force on February 27, 2005. Since Nigeria is a Party to this treaty she is obligated to domesticate its provisions. That is what Mamora’s bill seeks to achieve.

In his article, Olatoye said the tobacco control bill would discourage foreign investment. Olatoye also claimed that the legislation would affect the livelihoods of about 2,500 direct employees of BATN and over 300,000 others like retailers, farmers and suppliers.

Olatoye should correct his data. The publicist actually cried more that the bereaved. BATN on its website admits it employs only about 900 people for its entire operations. Where did Otatoye gets his 2,500 figure? The farmers Olatoye alluded to are simply highly impoverished farmers who also grow other crops apart from tobacco. Secondly, the 300,000 retailers he mentioned are the Malams and the itinerary traders who sell different types of consumer products of which cigarette is just one in a thousand.

Personally, I have been involved in close monitoring of the activities of tobacco companies and I have evidences to prove that BAT impoverishes families and encourages the use of children on tobacco farms. A simple survey carried out on the so called retailer’s show that cigarettes only form a tiny part of the overall products they sell. Take away cigarettes and it will not affect the overall income. This is the irony Olatoye celebrates as poverty alleviation when the company he represents has done more to improvish Nigerians in the last couple of years. We will not see the full extent of the so called BATN $150 million investment until about 20 years time when the kids of today now grown adult begin to get sick, in 20 years time when government begin to spend scarce resources to treat them and when hitherto promising Nigerians die because of tobacco related sickness.

If the Olatoye takes the time to read Mamora’s bill, he will see clearly that there is space for the Standards Organisation and the Advertising Council of Nigeria in the regulation of tobacco industry. What Mamora’s bill seeks to achieve is the regulation of tobacco as a means for promoting public health. The lead institution for promoting public health is the Federal Ministry of Health working in collaboration with other stakeholders. That is what Mamora’s bill recommend, that is the practice worldwide.

At this point, i will like to remind people who might be working for BAT like Olatoye that the same company has signed an agreement with the Food and Drugs Board in Ghana to prohibit all forms of tobacco advertising and promotion including branding of vehicles or point of sale, the yearly registration of each product at a yearly fee, health warning to include pictures to cover 50 per cent of the display area. The packs must carry “for sale in Ghana.”

Also this month, BAT agrees to comply with Mauritius government directive that cigarette packs must carry pictorial warnings to cover 65 percent of the display area. Mamora’s bill is recommending 50 per cent of the display area.

Besides, the United States government this month raised Federal taxes on tobacco products to 62 per cent. That excludes state taxes. New York state for instance, has a tax of $4.64 on each pack.

Olatoye’s argument about cigarette production as a way of diversifying Nigeria’s economic base in laughable. What he recommends is that Nigeria should continue to invest in a product that is rejected globally. That is warped economics. Cigarette sale is plummeting in most parts of the world. Even tobacco companies are diversifying.

I fully support more money going into government coffers, since oil price is dropping. What i recommend is high taxes on tobacco products and the removal of all tax incentives on cigarette production. It is time government ask BAT to return what it reaped illegitimately when they were benefitting from the Export Expansion Grant (EEG) and other tax reliefs granted them under the Obasanjo administration.

What tobacco companies in Nigeria are afraid of is an enlightened citizenry who will be ready to report to the authorities anytime they breach the law. They do not want a new Nigeria where the government takes the health of the citizens as sacred. They are afraid of public awareness to empower our youth to say an emphatic no to tobacco addiction. That is why they are afraid of Mamora’s bill.

Who could ever forget how tobacco companies have taken Nigerians for fools. Who will forget the several promotions like Wild & Wet, Loud In Lagos, St’ Moritz style collection, Experience It and most recently Experience Freshness where young lungs were targeted and lured or sometimes forced to smoke. There is no country on earth that would condone such dehumanizing and terribly wicked act against its young citizens.

For the purpose of emphasise, let me list some of the key points of the bill and why every Nigerian should support its early passage. First, the bill domesticates the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) which is an obligation since Nigeria is a Party to the Convention, it prohibits the sale of cigarettes to persons under the age of 18, prohibits sale of cigarettes in sticks.

The bill prohibits all forms of tobacco advertisement , sponsorships and promotions, endorsement or testimonial, it prohibits the sale of tobacco products 1,000 metre radius of any place designated as smoke free, also prohibits smoking in public places. The bill also empowers the government to use litigation to recoup liabilities related to tobacco consumption.

Going by these laudable objectives, I enjoin Olatoye to join other well meaning Nigerians to support Senator Mamoora and the National Assembly in creating a holistic approach to stop this menace in our midst. In that our names will be on the honourable side when history is written.

Seun Akioye is with the Environmental Rights Action/ Friends of the Earth Nigeria.

Group urges Senate to pass anti-tobacco bill

A Non-Governmental Organisation, Journalists Action on Tobacco and Health (JATH) has urged the Senate to speed up the passage of the 2009 National Tobacco Control Bill to allow for commencement of quick implementation of the WHO’s Framework convention on Tobacco Control(FCTC) which Nigeria ratified in 2005.

In a statement signed by the group’s Programme Manager, Mr. Yinka Olugbade, the group said the passage of the bill would help reduce tobacco-related deaths.

The group also commended Senator Olorunimbe Mamora for sponsoring the bill and working to ensure that it has passed the second reading.

“The Senate will be doing this nation a lot of good by passing this bill on time because the burden of cancer in Nigeria is appreciable and tobacco contributes a lot to this. According to the World Health Organisation, there are an estimated 100,000 new cancer cases in the country each year although observers believe the figure could become as high as 500,000 new cases annually by 2010.

“It is feared that by 2020, cancer incidence for Nigerian males and females may rise to 90.7/100,000 and 100.9/100,000 respectively. It is also anticipated that by 2020, death rates from cancer in Nigerian males and females may reach 72.7/100,000 and 76/100,000 respectively. But this only represents a tip of the iceberg if projections by the World Health Organization (WHO) are anything to go by.

“ In 2005 cancer killed eighty nine thousand people in Nigeria with fifty four thousand of this figure below the age of seventy. Essentially, the most common cancers documented in Nigeria to date are cancers of the uterus and breast for women and liver and prostate cancers for men. But many of these deaths can be avoided. Over 40% of all cancers can be prevented. Others can be detected early, treated and cured.

“With the passage of this bill, which will properly regulate tobacco use, cancer and other tobacco-related diseases are bound to be on the rebound,” the group noted.

Noting that a part of the bill contains incorporation of Pictorial warnings on the pack of cigarettes,JATH said,"There is no doubt that the sponsor of the Bill and the Nigerian Senate meant well for the welfare of its citizens.

"Incorporation of Pictorial Warning on tobacco product packets is important as majority of the tobacco users in this country will be able to have informed choice. World Health Organization (WHO), particularly approves of tobacco health warnings that contain both pictures and words because they are the most effective at convincing people to quit.

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