Weak laws hamstring LCC on smoking control  

Weak laws hamstring LCC on smoking control 

By Tony Nkhoma
LACK of legislative guide is hampering the Lusaka City Council (LCC) in dealing with public smoking, the local authority has said.

LCC director of public health Victor Kagoli said the prohibition of smoking in public was limited.

Kagoli cited gaps in the existing law as one of the critical challenges the local authority was facing in dealing with public smoking.

Speaking in Lusaka in an interview, Kagoli said when enacted into law the 2025 Tobacco Control Bill would complement the statutory instrument (SI) which advocated prohibition of smoking in public.

“You know, that’s how challenging it is. So the bill will just help us not necessarily deal or not always directly deal with the smoker. We deal with the premises,” Kagoli said.

He said LCC was looking forward to having the bill translated into law and being enforced.

“The challenge that we have as Lusaka City Council literally is that gap of law. You will agree with me that there’s so much limitation, particularly when dealing with public smoking,” Kagoli said.

He said the local authority currently used the Business Labour Act and had no specific guide on how best it could manage and handle issues related to tobacco and how it could be controlled.

Kagoli said one of the key issues LCC did was to provide licences for all businesses and not just for tobacco.

“So, in the provision of licences, our consideration is someone who is willing to conduct business and permitted business, so to say. And we use the Business Labour Act. So we have no specific guide on how best we can manage and handle issues related to tobacco and how we can control them. We are not guided,” Kagoli said.

He said once the 2025 Tobacco Control Bill was passed, LCC would leverage it for the implementation of various challenges it was facing related to tobacco.

“For example, it’s a bar. From the Liquor Licensing Act, we tell the bar owner to say, ‘provide a place if you are going to have any adult smoking, a smoking area’. And if someone is seen by the inspectors, the authorised officers, smoking in such a premises, we are slow to deal with the smoker but quick to deal with the owner of the premises because he’s been given that mandate to control,” Kagoli said.

He said once the 2025 Tobacco Control Bill was passed, the local authority would have more instruments to help it control the problem,” Kagoli said.