The proposed Tobacco Control Bill has ignited a firestorm of controversy, with retailers warning that its draconian licensing requirements will suffocate legitimate businesses while rolling out the red carpet for illicit trade cartels.

Kenya’s retail sector is sounding the alarm over what it describes as a legislative chokehold. The new bill, while ostensibly designed to curb smoking, proposes a labyrinth of bureaucratic hurdles that industry captains warn will drive costs into the stratosphere and force compliant shopkeepers to close their doors. The real winner in this regulatory overreach, they argue, will not be public health, but the shadowy underworld of tax-evading smugglers.

The License Raj Returns

At the heart of the dispute is a proposal requiring every manufacturer and importer of tobacco or nicotine products to obtain direct approval from the Cabinet Secretary for Health. This centralization of power is being slammed as a return to the "License Raj," creating a bottleneck that invites corruption and delay. Retailers argue that this provision introduces:

• Duplicative Levies: County governments would be empowered to impose their own separate licenses, creating a double-taxation nightmare for small businesses.
• Operational Paralysis: The requirement for CS-level approval for routine product stocking introduces uncertainty that supply chains cannot sustain.
• Cost Prohibitions: The administrative burden of compliance will inevitably be passed on to consumers, or worse, absorb the razor-thin margins of small traders.

For the "mama mboga" and the corner kiosk owner, these rules are existential. Unlike large supermarkets that can absorb compliance costs, the informal sector—which moves the bulk of Kenya’s fast-moving consumer goods—faces a stark choice: stop selling legal products or turn to the black market.

A Gift to the Black Market

The most damning critique of the bill is its potential to fuel the very vice it seeks to crush. History has shown that when legal products become too expensive or difficult to obtain, consumers do not stop using them; they simply switch to cheaper, unregulated alternatives. The rapid growth of the illicit tobacco market in Kenya is already a national security concern, with proceeds often linked to organized crime and terror financing.

By pushing legitimate products out of the regulated retail environment, the bill risks creating a vacuum that will be instantly filled by counterfeiters. These illicit traders do not check IDs, do not pay taxes, and do not adhere to quality standards. "We are effectively handing over the market to criminals," one industry insider remarked. "The government loses revenue, the retailer loses business, and the consumer loses safety. It is a lose-lose-lose scenario."

As Parliament debates these provisions, the message from the retail trade is clear: regulation should be smart, not suffocating. If the goal is to protect public health, the focus must be on enforcement and education, not on strangling the formal economy with red tape.