Dantong’s death great loss to public health, says ERA/FoEN

The Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria (ERA/FoEN) has described the killing of Senator Gyang Dantong, chair of the Senate Committee on Health as a great loss to public health.

Dantong, Honorable Gyang Fulani, the Majority Leader of the Plateau State House of Assembly and several others were shot by unknown gunmen during the burial of people killed during a recent violence in Jos. The incident took place at Barkin Ladi Local Government Area of Plateau State.

In a statement issued in Lagos, ERA/FoEN said the death of the Senator was wicked, condemnable and a sad reference on how security has degenerated in the country.

"Senator Datong's murder along with others is shocking and very sad indeed. It is another illustration of how our dear Nigeria is sliding dangerously," said ERA/FoEN Executive Director, Nnimmo Bassey.

According to ERA/FoEN Director, Corporate Accountability Campaigns, Akinbode Oluwafemi, Senator Dantong will be remembered for his contributions to the upliftment of public health, particularly tobacco control.

"ERA/FoEN has worked closely with Senator Dangtong for over eight years since his days as a member of the House of Representative. He was a perfect gentleman who cannot hurt a fly. He was a dependable ally during the debates the National Tobacco Control Bill (NTCB) which was passed by the Sixth Assembly.

Oluwafemi added: “while we pray to God to give his family the fortitude to bear this great loss. We urge the federal government to commence immediate investigation of the circumstances surrounding his death and bring perpetrators to Justice.”

ERA/FoEN also called on government to take drastic actions to arrest the deplorable security situation across the country, saying the killing of a serving Senator is indicative of the fact that “government is not on top of the situation.”

Enough is enough on smoking parties'

Akinbobe Olufemi of environmental rights action

What is the status of the tobacco bill in the National Assembly?

I think the Senate Committee on Health, probably will have the most updated piece of news about the status of this bill. Because for us as a pressure group and citizens of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, we have done what is expected of us in terms of giving the necessary technical back up, helping to mobilise support, helping to explain to the Nigerian people what this bill is all about. And as can be confirmed by both the media and surveys carried out in Nigeria, this is one bill that is enjoying overwhelming support because it is a public health bill.

This is a bill that is also enjoying overwhelming support in the Senate. But we are surprised that since the public hearing in July 21, 2009, the Senate committee is yet to turn back this bill for passage at the plenary of the Senate. Don't forget that at the second reading of the bill, the Senate president actually gave that committee two weeks to work on the bill. Now, two years after, we are yet to see this bill which everybody agrees is of utmost importance, that this bill will help in reducing the number of deaths, ill health, and cost on our economy that is associated with smoking.

So in terms of what we know, we know that this bill has passed second reading, that over 40 NGOs including five international NGOs made presentations in support of this bill. We also know that the tobacco industry was adequately represented at the public hearing and they were asked, ‘do you actually have any problem with this bill'? And I remember, it is on tape, that the representative of the tobacco industry said no but that they were only questioning a few sections in this bill. So why the Senate Health Committee has not been able to deliver this bill to the Nigerian people is actually a question only that committee can answer.

What about the argument that passage of the bill result in job cuts?

BAT (British American Tobacco) has been using people to confuse both the media and the Senate, about the likely impact of this bill, and one of them is that is Senator Adedibu who said that over 200,000 Nigerians would lose their jobs. He later moved it up to 300,000. And at the public hearing, he was well seated when BAT was asked what their staff strength in Nigeria was and they replied that they have less than 1,000 in direct employment.

They were also asked to give the figure of their wholesalers; people who live directly on the tobacco business in Nigeria and the tobacco companies' representatives said about 3,000. We are talking about the wholesalers, retailers, distributors, etc. But you and I know that we cannot add that mallam that is selling 1,000 products of which cigarette is one of them, as somebody that will lose his job if he is asked not to sell cigarettes.

So what they are doing is to add the numerous people they know that somehow, because of the nature of their petty trade, sell cigarettes as people that are in direct BAT employment. That is one of the lies that is being peddled against this bill.

Any plan for a Smoke Free Lagos?

We have started that discussion because everybody is looking up to Lagos. The two states we are working on now actually approached us. We had approached Lagos State before and somehow it didn't work. I think that Lagos State is best placed now to begin a smoke-free policy, because they have actually confirmed that the state is spending so much money in treating victims of tobacco addiction. We are ready to work with them anytime any day. We initiated discussion long ago with them; we'd actually done some draft work with them and we are ready to continue on that.

What about the issue of smoking parties?

BAT has shown the Nigerian government that it is not ready to do business according to the rules of our land. BAT will go to the Senate and say something and go underground and do something else.

This issue of smoking parties actually came up in the public hearing and they were denying to high heavens. Now, we can see this is a company that is not to be trusted. We exposed the smoking parties in 2008 and they even issued a statement up to their corporate office in London, to say that they don't do something like that. Yet they've gone ahead to organise other secret parties.

Our expose is just to let the Nigerian government know that these people are still going about recruiting our youth into smoking through very mean measures, including organising parties where you have half-naked girls lighting up cigarettes for people. And if not that we got the photos, probably they would have come up to deny again that something like that was held.

What we are just saying now, particularly on the smoking parties is that enough is enough. Whether the bill is passed or not, we as citizens of this country, we have the right to protest; to embark on civil action to stop activities that we know are inimical to the health of our youth. So when next they are coming to Lagos for their next smoking party, they will be ready to see us there. We have enough intelligence to gather where they will be going. Next time we will stop it. It is either they stop it or we stop it for them.

SOURCE

BRITISH AMERICAN TOBACCO INTENSIFIES INDIRECT ADVERTISING

By Seun Akioye

Dominant tobacco manufacturing company in Nigeria, the British American Tobacco Nigeria (BATN) has intensified its Corporate Responsibility campaign with the full page advertorial in the Guardian newspaper of October 15th 2009.

The Corporate Responsibility advertisement published by the British American Tobacco Nigeria Foundation (BATNF) featured the various gift presentations to certain section of the tobacco farming community in Nigeria. Such presentations include goats, provision of bore hole and teaching the skills in fish farming.

The advertisement also coincide with an advertorial by the Nigerian Tobacco Control Alliance (NTCA) and Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth Nigeria (ERA/FoEN) published in the Punch newspaper of the same date asking the Senate to fast track the passage of the National Tobacco Control Bill. The advertorial published under the title ‘Tobacco Facts’ is part of a series of enlightenment campaign lecture by the groups. The publication has dealth with various issues regarding tobacco and health in Nigeria

Meanwhile tobacco control community has reacted swiftly condemning the action and calling the publication of the tobacco company as indirect advertisement. The NTCA in a statement condemned the advertorial calling it propaganda. “There are more pressing social issues in Nigeria that BATN foundation can tackle not the feakle corporate social responsibility of providing goats and garri for farmers. This is indirect advertisement and we condemn it in totality. Let them however spend that money in looking for a solution to the various ailments caused by their products.”

Media officer ERA/FoEN, Philip Jakpor also in a statement described the publication of the CSR efforts as shambles. “ This is another way of advertising. It is designed to boost the ego and promote the products of British American Tobacco and the gesture does not in any way reflect the true belief of the tobacco industry. It has been asked and we ask again ‘ can a company that produces a product that kills its users ever be socially responsible? The first thing to do to be socially responsible is to stop the production of lethal products. Before they do that, we are calling for Corporate Accountability.”

Interestingly, advertising and marketing sponsorship of any tobacco products have been banned in Nigeria since 2004.

RE: Much Ado About Tobacco

This sort of 'syndicated dare-devil' journalism will only stripe you of your pedigree. If only you have been following the year’s long campaign to make you and your families have the choice of breathing free air devoid of the contaminations from tobacco smoking, you will not be risking your precious integrity to publish syndicated materials from this merchant of death.

I read with disdain and pitying your ignorance on the importance of putting in place a new tobacco control laws in Nigeria. Wondering why the need to cook up assumption with regards to the Senate Committee on Health’s recent public hearing on the National Tobacco Control Bill 2009. This is another media stunt well done and for the 'dough', simple. That's not ‘just’ at all. It is with the same ‘damning all, throwing cautions to the wind attitudes’ with which you penned your name on this story that these tobacco manufactures are targeting your little children. Their strategy is simple; caught them young, use baits, hunt for financially pressed media voices to propagate falsehood and you know the rest. They are out orchestrating a device targeted at your children and you are saying ‘much ado about tobacco’, what kind of a father’s heart have you got?

Secondly, you need to know that journalists all the world over are playing prominent roles in the promotion of tobacco control advocacy because the pursuit of truth is just. It is sad therefore that you suddenly silenced your journalism ethic of objectivity in the face of Naira and to the detriment of your nation. Or was it in foreign currency you were paid to push this through and knowing it would malign the hard earned credibility of very newspaper. You could have written to carefully examine the matter from its economic and health perspective as the Distinguished Senate President David Mark spoke so profoundly while declaring the public hearing opened. But this undeserving as an editorial material underscores the importance of all the efforts. In other word, the investment of time and money expended by the Senate, the Senate Health Committee to deem it fit to repeal an old law with a more proactive one and in order to address a very critical dilemma is unnecessary.

Writing in assumption without taking a trip to Oke Ogun and other tobacco growing farms to discover the truth is unacceptable. Have you compared it with a similar antecedent of our Cocoa production era and its impact on national life? Now bring it down to the reality, if this is the experiences of the tobacco farmers BAT and her accolades are spending mega billions to sing and dance in the media they are creating jobs for. If you have consulted with the body of research done by World Health Organization, American Cancer Society and several other global agencies most trusted on the subject, then one would think maybe, just maybe, the anti tobacco movement got it all wrong. Nigerians also deserve to know from you if there are benefits acquiring from smoking. Your essay is biased and greatly lacked in details to the detriment of the good of all mankind.

If this bill is not just, then the series of ‘evil-intended’ publications going about in the media, obviously sponsored by those who are threatened by the mere mentioning of the National Tobacco Control Bill 2009 and aimed at pitching two Nigerian patriot against the other to discredit the collective will and genuine intention to guarantee the rights of smokers and non-smokers in this country. Perhaps, if there exist ‘plenty noise about nothing’, it is the continuous fabrication of falsehood by your kind working for the Big Tobacco (Merchant of Death) to blindfold truth. Your refusal to see any significant goal portray you as an enemy of the people in that you are only interested in maintaining the status quo for BAT and others merchants. If we listen to you, then we would be sending the next generation of Nigerian youths into drug dependency, we would be licensing cigarette manufactures to keep killing our loved ones, to make us spend more on healthcare treating preventable illness as well as dependants of the dead – deaths caused by tobacco smoking.

What is sinister about a bill conceived with all genuine intention to repeal another because the reality demands for it? This is the reason you consented that ‘this kind of bill should be seen as a good thing…’ It is confusing that you commended the Tobacco Control Act 1990 and refuse to see the need for its replacement with a proactive one even when such is expedient. More than you can imagine, these tobacco companies knows what they are doing. By successfully using you as a willing ally to push these ‘white lies’ shows their desperation and callousness at playing the game. Their entire move to suppress truth, to delay the passage of the bill and distort reality with massive advertising strategies is just ‘buying time’ to kill more Nigerians. You should have requested for the recording of the public hearing and see how BAT trembled and shake discovering that the civil nature of the bill also have criminal appeal.

For a reminder, the singular act of penning your name against falsehood will go down in history. Let's imagine that you even smoke and want your children or relatives to do so. That is yours and their rights. As you quoted, "equity follows the law if it is just", where then is the right of the non-smokers and smokers should the later decide to seek redress in the court of law for damages resulting from taking a product made by BAT? Is tobacco not classified under drug and why should it be sold by an ‘Aboki’ and to a minor. Or don’t you think, all of these are missing in the Tobacco Control Act 1990, and that, it is in order be just (putting tobacco in proper perspective, economy versus health, weighing the gains over loss to the Nigerians) that the Senate thought it fit to review this provision. More so, the position of the Nigerian Senate on this bill is clear and just. These efforts deserved to be commended even as the bill scale through its final path to passage.

Adeyinka Olugbade
Programme Manager
JATH

Much ado about tobacco

-Mobolaji Sanusi

What is the big deal about a Tobacco bill? This is the multi-million Naira question that followers of controversies trailing the above bill before the Senate Committee on Health may be seeking answers for. The bill is aimed at repealing the Tobacco (Control) Act 1990 and to enact the National Tobacco Control bill 2008. Its stated goals like the 1990 one are laudable – to provide for the regulation or control of production, manufacture sale, advertising, promotion and sponsorship of tobacco or tobacco products and other related matters.
The bill is sponsored by Senator Adeleke Mamora, a medical doctor, ostensibly in tandem with some groups of lawyers in the country. Ordinarily, this kind of bill should be seen as a good thing considering the fact that since the tenure of military president Ibrahim Babangida, the late Professor Olikoye Ransome-Kuti who was then Minister of Health, championed the battle for regulation of tobacco smoking. It was then that the issue of public smoking and compulsory inscription of ‘tobacco smoking is dangerous to your health’ on packet of cigarettes, on billboards and other forms of advertisement were enforced.
Thus, the current bill is not out to achieve any significant goal different from what Professor Olikoye Ransome-Kuti achieved during the military era. But the bill that is still at the public hearing, stage in the Senate is generating so much controversy and this has attracted intense public attention. Many are wondering why there is no much ado about this new Bill for an Act to repeal the Tobacco (Control) Act 1990.
For this reason, I have taken time to look for the bill, got a copy and have since realized that the bill is as needless as the artificial controversy surrounding it. Certain provisions of the bill (sections 40-45) question the professed altruistic motive of most promoters of the bills: it is important to ask whether most promoters of bills put national interest over personal gains in their pursuits of legislative enactments. Whatever their motives, it is also germane to point out that that is why there are levels of checks in legislative drafting – first, second, and third readings and even the stage of public hearings in legislative enactment processes. But does the National Assembly legislators adhere to this in the overall interest of the nation or just see it as something just there for being there sake? Could it be that the effort by the Senate Health Committee to play by the rules and not allow arm twisting actually led to the on-going controversy on the matter?
What I do know is that there is something sinister about the purport of the bill which might not completely be in the overall interest of the nation. The issue of Child Rights that came out of the bills public hearing that has generated heated debates between Senator Iyabo Obasanjo-Bello and Mrs. Maryam Uwais might be a decoy aimed at blackmailing somebody so that the bill can enjoy easy passage.
Let us get it right ab initio that cigarette smoking is without equivocation dangerous to the health of both young and old persons. This is acknowledged by the Tobacco companies that agreed with the legislation that compels them to inscribe the warning that cigarette smoking is dangerous to health. Professor Ransome-Kuti himself was a chain smoker of cigarette and this warning would not even deter him and many others in his shoes from smoking. There are several people in high places, including state governors whose governments are suing Tobacco companies who are today chain smokers too. What moral right do these sets of people have to sue the cigarette producing companies? Among the downtrodden in this country, millions engage in legal cigarette smoking. It is at least better than smoking of marijuana and other illicit drugs. The present cases before the court are stalled because of unfavourable rules of evidence which the bill is avariciously planned to cure when passed in to law.
Some of these curious provisions in the bill attempt to empower the government to sue and make claims from tobacco companies for cost incurred from treating tobacco related ailment victims. For example, this provision presupposes that there are free medical services in the country. This is a fallacious assumption as the social safety nets in the country are almost zero. So, the proposed recourse to legal actions by states through the services of certain group of lawyers is laughable. This is not within the jurisprudential sociological theory of law espoused by Rosco Pound. These state governments and their ambitious lawyers behind the bill should also study more of Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Realistic School of legal Jurisprudence. Any piece of law worth its salt should be made for the society and not vice-versa. Any law or provisions of it that is out to force itself on the society would only benefit few individuals for a short while before subsequently roiling into oblivion.
The all important legal principle; volunti non fit injuria (voluntary assumption of risk) in the Law of Tort applies in the case of smokers of cigarette. If after the warning and other precautions, people still go ahead and smoke, nobody or entity should be blamed but the smokers themselves.
Morally, some of the state governors who engage in smoking with some of their cabinet members should not have approved the suits being pursued on their behalf by some lawyers in the first instance. Within the Presidency today, there are smokers who are not ready to quit the habit. Would the state be right to claim compensation on behalf of leaders and others no matter their ages who voluntarily take to smoking as habit? I hope this bill is not out to benefit few lawyers who are its covertly promoters?
Most parents smoke cigarettes and even send their wards to buy same for them. These children copy the habit from them. Should anyone or an entity be blamed for this? This is why the issue of prohibiting communications of any form by entities producing cigarettes becomes deluding or the selling of cigarettes within particular radius from certain public places hypocritical. One, it is through advertisement on the danger of smoking that smokers can be more aware of the risk they voluntarily put upon themselves.
Not allowing sale within a certain radius or outright prohibition would make illegal tobacco sale business thrive thereby making monitoring difficult. Tobacco smoking would be a difficult thing to eradicate in any country. In Christianity as well as Islam, it is one thing that is not prohibited but strands condemned because of its hazardous health implications. There should be moderation in the mode of its legislation. What the country should bother about is the creation of standard and effective monitoring through agencies like the Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) and the Consumer Protection Council (CPC). One of the tobacco companies, British-America tobacco, reportedly had paid tax in excess of over N80 billion since 2001 and gives employment to hundreds of Nigerians from its 150 million dollar factory. This is aside its corporate social responsibilities that gulped hundreds of millions of Naira too.
The question is: Can Nigeria afford to trade off the sector at this point through this draconian bill that might send companies operating therein out of business via needless, avoidable law suits- at a time most big companies are relocating to neighbouring countries? The answer is in the negative

SOURCE

NIGERIA: A BILL FOR AN ACT TO AMEND TOBACCO CONTROL ACT

The Bill Seeks to repeal the Tobacco Control Act 1990 Cap. T16 Laws of the Fedaration and to Enact the National Tobacco Bill 2009 to provide for the regulation or Control of Production, Manufacture, Sale, Advertising, Promotion, and Sponsorship of Tobacco or Tobacco Product in Nigeria.

ERA lauds Senate over anti-tobacco bill

Press Release
February 12, 2009

The Environmental Rights Action/Friends of the Earth, Nigeria (ERA/FoEN) has commended the Senate for giving overwhelming support to the National Tobacco Control Bill 2009, which scaled the second reading last Wednesday, saying the bill, when passed into law, will have "far-reaching" implications on the well-being of Nigerians.

ERA/FoEN, in a reaction to the Senate mandate to its Committee on Health to process a bill to control the manufacture, sale and advertising of tobacco products, among others, said the decision marks a "turning point" in the torturous campaign to put a rein on tobacco-related deaths in the country.

The bill 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 sale of cigarettes by the sticks, all forms of advertisements, sponsorships, testimonials and promotion.

Senate Deputy Minority Leader, Olorunnimbe Adeleke Mamora who sponsored the bill noted strongly that while the much-hyped British American Tobacco Nigeria (BATN) operations have provided jobs for less than 1,000 Nigerians, it is responsible for the death and ill-health of several thousands .

"This is a positive rhythm coming from the Senate because the overwhelming support the bill received is a clear indication that the Distinguished Members of the Senate have acted in tandem with the wishes and aspirations of Nigerians that appropriate legislation are urgently needed to curtail the activities the tobacco industry and rescue millions of Nigerians from the pangs of tobacco addiction," said ERA/FoEN Programme Manager Mr. Akinbode Oluwafemi.

Oluwafemi said that the Senate opted for a fast-track of the passage of the bill shows they understand the magnitude of the tobacco menace on the lives of Nigerians and particularly the under-aged that are conscripted into smoking through dubious marketing tactics.

"This laudable step by the Senate strengthens our belief that our campaign to ensure that government domesticates provisions of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) which Nigeria signed and ratified alongside over 160 countries will become a reality as soon as possible.

"We urge Members of the Senate not to allow themselves be to distracted by tobacco industry lobbyists and look forward to a complete ban on sale of cigarettes in sticks and the introduction of warning labels that will cover 50 per cent of cigarette pack and ultimately, high taxes on tobacco products, Oluwafemi noted.

Philip Jakpor
Media Officer
ERA/FoEN