Were cigarettes really even bad in the first place?

Yes! Those sinful things are back!

Well those that were gone in the first place. You’d think that if they wanted to limit contact perhaps condoms would have also been taken off the shelves but I suppose even the government has to admit it’s defeated before it even fights sometimes.

Nobody is complaining right now, save for those already in court and pushing on. It would be interesting to see what the results of those cases are, but for the everyday South African, their focus would likely be on a different kind of case all together … and cartons.

As the masses rush to their local shops to refill the state coffers with mountains of sin tax, we need to consider why this moment, 00h01 on 18 August 2020 was deemed to be the ideal time to allow the country to access to its pleasures once again.

It is particularly important to reflect on what the President told us though; that the virus has seemingly peaked in Gauteng, Eastern Cape, Western Cape, and possibly KwaZulu-Natal. But what of the other provinces? More importantly, what of the possibility of a resurgence as other countries have experiences?

The President himself acknowledged countries going through additional waves.

The country’s infection numbers are going down and that’s great. Can we attribute that to the measures the state took? I’m still not convinced, and neither are groups currently in court on the matter.

If you could put a bullet in the head of every infected person as they test positive, you’d have an effective way of getting the infection rate down but it wouldn’t be a moral, ethical, or legal method.

Stopping the spread is not the single highest priority of the state. If it were, the methods would likely have been far more draconian (if you could even imagine that).

But even if it were the government’s one job to stop the spread, would have preventing people from zolling, curbed the spread?

We know that the re-banning of alcohol was due to the increased occupancy of emergency rooms for alcohol related incidences and there was an element of justification there, but for the ciggies? What was that all about?

Did the government think that people would just take it lying down and those addicted to nicotine would just quit cold turkey, in the interest of those who usually bounce cigarettes from person to person? Did all the intel at the government’s disposal convince them that the illegal cigarette trade wouldn’t thrive and that the buying power of that UIF claim which some are still waiting for wouldn’t diminish further on the black market?

And then what? Did they suddenly realise that when people zol, they don’t always share that zol?

I just don’t get it. If the state wanted to play a paternal role and police behaviour to protect us, why wait till now to call it off, when several provinces haven’t peaked, and before there is a suitable vaccine available?

The numbers are still higher than they were when the lockdown was first called and far more wide spread.

I’m very happy to be able to head to my local hubbly shop and buy some tobacco and that’s exactly what I’ll be doing right after this.

It’s just that, in much the same way as people are saying, don’t get too excited that you don’t ask questions about where the R500 billion went, we should also be asking ourselves another question:
With all the dreadful impact this pandemic has had, is it too much to expect some argumentative consistency from our leadership or at the very least, the admission that they were wrong on certain matters?

We shouldn’t need a court case to hear, “hey, we thought this was important to help prevent the spread but it turns out that it wasn’t so we’ll fix it”.

Richard Anthony Chemaly entertainment attorney, radio broadcaster and lecturer of communication ethics.

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