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Tobacco Act Amendment Bill is damaging to Nigeria, industry monitoring centre warns National Assembly – EnviroNews
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The Africa Centre for Tobacco Industry Monitoring and Policy Research (ATIM) has urged the National Assembly to urgently reconsider the proposed amendments to Nigeria’s National Tobacco Control Act 2015, saying the so-called “Tobacco Harm Reduction” provisions sought to be inserted in the Act endanger the country’s hard-fought tobacco control gains.
In a statement seen by Corporate Accountability and Public Participation Africa (CAPPA), on Sunday, August 9, 2026, ATIM backed the Nigerian tobacco control community’s rejection of the proposed changes, warning that the proposals could weaken the country’s tobacco control framework and create loopholes for the tobacco industry to addict Nigerians, especially the youth, with nicotine and other “so-called non-combustible products.”
The organisation said the development was particularly concerning given Nigeria’s progress in reducing smoking prevalence and its obligations under the World Health Organisation Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (WHO FCTC).
“Nigeria should be strengthening the measures that have helped reduce smoking, not creating new policy openings that could undermine those gains,” ATIM said.
According to the organisation, the amendment process was initially presented as an effort to strengthen implementation of the National Tobacco Control Act 2015, correct identified weaknesses and close loopholes affecting emerging tobacco and nicotine products.
However, ATIM noted that the harmonised Bill subsequently considered by the House of Representatives introduced “Tobacco Harm Reduction” among the objectives of the legislation and created separate provisions for non-combustible products, including electronic nicotine products and nicotine pouches.
It said the significant shift requires greater transparency and public scrutiny.
According to tobacco control activists, Tobacco Harm Reduction is a discredited tactic through which the industry lobbies to openly market nicotine products, such as vapes, e-cigarettes, heated tobacco products (HTPs), smokeless nicotine pouches and other electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS), by claiming that these addictive products will help tobacco users quit.
ATIM noted that adult smoking prevalence in Nigeria is now estimated at around 5–6 per cent, representing substantial progress compared with previous decades.
Rather than risk reversing this progress, it urged the Nigerian government to prioritise proven tobacco control measures, including comprehensive smoke-free environments, stronger taxation and health warnings, prohibition of tobacco advertising, promotion and sponsorship, improved cessation support, measures against illicit trade and stronger implementation of Article 5.3 of the WHO FCTC.
The organisation also warned that emerging nicotine products could provide a new pathway to nicotine addiction, particularly among young people.
“Nothing prevents Nigeria from adopting evidence-based cessation or risk-reduction interventions where they are independently demonstrated to benefit population health,” ATIM said. “But there is no need to embed a changing and contested commercial concept such as ‘Tobacco Harm Reduction’ as a statutory objective.”
ATIM said the National Assembly should also provide greater clarity on how the provisions relating to “Tobacco Harm Reduction” and non-combustible products came into the harmonised Bill.
It stressed that it had not established that the tobacco industry drafted or caused the insertion of the provisions, but argued that their source should be publicly explained given the growing commercial importance of new nicotine products to multinational tobacco companies.
The organisation called for disclosure of stakeholders who proposed the relevant provisions, submissions received during the legislative process, meetings held with tobacco and nicotine industry representatives or organisations representing their interests, and the evidence relied upon in developing the differentiated regulatory framework.
It stressed that such transparency was particularly important under Article 5.3 of the WHO FCTC, which requires governments to protect tobacco control policies from the commercial and other vested interests of the tobacco industry.
ATIM also urged tobacco control organisations, researchers, professional associations and public health advocates across Africa to closely monitor developments in Nigeria, warning that the country’s legislation could set an important precedent for tobacco control policy elsewhere on the continent.
“Nigeria has made important progress in reducing smoking. The task now is to accelerate that progress towards a genuinely smoke-free generation, not create new opportunities for nicotine addiction or reopen policy space for an industry whose commercial future increasingly depends on new nicotine products,” ATIM said.
The organisation therefore called on the National Assembly to ensure that any amendment to the Tobacco Control Act strengthens, rather than weakens, Nigeria’s public health protections and remains firmly aligned with the WHO FCTC.
Last Thursday, CAPPA, the Nigeria Tobacco Control Alliance (NTCA), Gatefield Impact, Nigerian Cancer Society, Association of Resident Doctors, Abuja and other members of the Nigerian Tobacco Control Community demanded the immediate withdrawal of the Bill, and urged President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to withhold assent should the text be presented for executive approval.
