Photo: Pixabay
Photo: Pixabay
If there’s one thing we have learned over the past two days, it’s that British American Tobacco (BATSA) lawyer Albert Cockrell has quite the acid tongue. He has been arguing to get the cigarette ban lifted in the Western Cape High Court this week and finished with a flourish as the case came to an end on Thursday.
Cigarette ban latest – when will we get the court judgement?
Judgement has been reserved, meaning that we will now have to wait for a final verdict. Whether that will take days or weeks is anyone’s guess, but the applicants have pushed fiercely for an urgent response.
Earlier in the day, lawyers representing Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma and the government maintained that the cigarette ban was implemented to save lives, and its continuation is allowing health services to cope better with the demands of the pandemic. Cockrell, however, lashed out at their defence.
Dlamini-Zuma case branded ‘hopeless’ by BATSA lawyer
BATSA’s representative slammed Cabinet for putting together a case based on ‘hopeless’ information. He questioned why South Africa serves as the only nation in the world currently functioning with a cigarette ban, and cast serious aspersions on data models presented by Dlamini-Zuma and her colleagues:
“The WHO’s attitude on smoking has always been the same, even before the pandemic, and then the government didn’t ban the sale of cigarettes. Quite simply, nowhere does the WHO recommend implementing a prohibition on the sale of cigarettes… Losses in excise duties is a harm [to everyone in the country].”
“How will the minister know when the threat of a shortage of ICU beds would have passed? Dlamini-Zuma has failed to provide the court with details of the shortage, or the threat. The ‘quit smoking’ survey government is relying on is hopeless for a matter of this magnitude and importance.”
Alfred Cockrell, representing BATSA in the cigarette ban court case
Adv Cockrell SC says that Adv Pillay called the BAT's calculations "simplistic".
— تنوير (@TanveerJeewa) August 6, 2020
Adv Cockrell SC: "Back in the good old days, they would have said our calculations were written on the back of a cigarette box but now… we do not have any more cigarette boxes for calculations."
