We Support Senate Ban on Shisha-Joel Gitali
We fully support the Senate on the issue of enforcing Shisha ban and banning emerging tobacco/ products such as oral nicotine pouches and e-cigarettes. This country has got more noise coming from the executive than tangible solutions to our problems.
Due to perennial fights and corruption in the Ministry of health , that have become worse, the tobacco industry is having a field day in the country.
The appointment of two Principal Secretaries for the Ministry from the so called shareholding communities to work under a Cabinet Secretary from another community has not helped the situation. The established cartels are fighting back as the new ones try to take over. The situation is now taking sort of a tribal shape.
Fights for the tobacco control resources have derailed Tobacco Control and threaten to reverse all the gains made over the years. The Tobacco Control Division and the Tobacco Control Board are two entities that have become toxic. They aren’t providing guidance to the rest of Tobacco Control stakeholders, they aren’t advising the Cabinet Secretary anymore. They need streamlining. We need order.
Tobacco Control Fund is receiving Solarium compensatory contribution, from manufacturers and importers of tobacco and related products. The fund is being managed without any known legal frame work. There is no transparency, no accountability and literally no tobacco control work being funded.
We therefore call upon the two houses that represent us to rise to the occasion and save the situation. We are tired of Mafia house. We need Afya house to serve Kenyans.
By
Joel Gitali the chairman Kenya Tobacco Control and Health Promotion Alliance
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