Ghana is set to complete its ratification of the Protocol to Eliminate Illicit Trade in Tobacco Products, an international treaty under the aegis of the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). The move is a landmark step for a country where one in five cigarettes are sold illegally and an…
Note: This article was updated on March 26, 2021 to include comments from Apollinaire Compaoré. Two troubling recent investigations from the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) have shone a fresh spotlight on the tobacco industry’s continued complicity in tobacco smuggling in Africa. The first highlighted how Philip Morris…
A consortium of tobacco companies has taken the South African government to court in a bid to overturn the administration’s decision to ban the sale of alcohol and tobacco products during the Covid-19 pandemic. Japan Tobacco International (JPI) and British American Tobacco South Africa (BATSA), together with The South Africa…
South Africa, although hailed as one of the most prosperous economies on the African continent, remains a country of missed opportunities. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) once again made this clear in its consultations with the Treasury, urging the government to implement reforms to tackle weak growth as well as…
The timing of Johann van Loggerenberg’s new book, Tobacco Wars, could scarcely have been more apt. Just a couple of weeks after South Africa’s former crime-buster published a brutal exposé of the cigarette industry, Zimbabwean tobacco kingpin Simon Rudland was shot at nine times in an apparent assassination attempt. Rudland,…
Arnaud is a French freelance writer with an African heart who has lived in 10 different Sub-Saharan countries in the past decade. He is currently based in Paris.
An internal United Nations document that appears to question an existing ban on tobacco company engagement with the UN is raising a few eyebrows, following its publication by journalist Colum Lynch at Foreign Policy. The memo from Michael Møller, the outgoing director of the UN Office at Geneva (UNOG), was…
As South African lawmakers press ahead with a range of tobacco control measures, some of the most vehement opposition has come from the tobacco industry itself. While the source of opposition is hardly surprising, the key message is: the manufacturers claim the new plans will stop people from quitting smoking….
Arnaud is a French freelance writer with an African heart who has lived in 10 different Sub-Saharan countries in the past decade. He is currently based in Paris.