Syria Today | Café owners unhappy over smoking ban

Café owners unhappy over smoking ban

A decree signed last month which bans smoking in Syria’s restaurants, bars, sports halls, cinemas and other public places is facing resistance from smokers and café owners alike.

The decree covers both cigarettes and narghile, the water pipes much loved by Syrians young and old. Details such as a date for when the ban comes into effect are yet to be clarified, but according to the BBC those caught breaking the ban will face a fine of SYP 2,000 (USD 43.50).

In Rawda Café, the Damascene institution populated by smoking men reading newspapers and playing backgammon, the main trade is narghile. Many clients are unhappy at the prospect of the new law.

“I can understand the ban in hospitals and schools,” Rashad Kokash, a 50-year-old television director, told Syria Today. “But I consider cafés a personal space. I come here to smoke.”

Kokash said he would still come to drink tea and see his friends, but that he would be sad to see the atmosphere change.

“It’s hard to tell if people will stop coming or not, but the new law will almost certainly hurt my profits if I can’t sell narghile,” Rawda’s owner Ahmad Kozoroch said. “In places such as France, the ban is fine because people can go outside for a quick cigarette. You can’t do that with a water pipe.”

Kozoroch says he plans to designate the café’s courtyard as a smoking area and make enclosed, covered areas non-smoking. Other restaurant and café owners without open space do not have that option, with some saying they would simply defy the ban and pay bribes to inspectors.

Not all Syrians are against the law, however. “There are lots of outside places people can go and not all of us want to be surrounded by smoke,” Nadia, 21, a student at Damascus University, said.

The anti-smoking drive has even won praise from smokers. “I am a doctor and I don’t want my children to suffer the health issues I am already suffering from,” Mahmoud Etah, 48, a heavy narghile smoker, said.

The law is part of the Syrian government’s ongoing campaign to reduce smoking. Some 60 percent of adult men and 23 percent of women smoke, according to the Syrian Society for Countering Cancer, with 20 percent of men and 6 percent of women regular narghile smokers.

The toll on the population’s health is seen as a ticking time bomb by health officials. According to the World Health Organization 240,000 people in the eastern Mediterranean region, including the Middle East, die from cancer annually. That figure is expected to rise by 180 percent by 2025. Smoking is already banned in government offices and public transport under a 2006 law, but the rules are often flouted. As an added disincentive to smoke, the price of Syrian cigarettes was raised last month.