Lets chew up the evidence – A comment on the prohibition of khat

Citation

(2013), "Lets chew up the evidence – A comment on the prohibition of khat", Drugs and Alcohol Today, Vol. 13 No. 3. https://doi.org/10.1108/DAT-07-2013-0030

Lets chew up the evidence – A comment on the prohibition of khat

Article Type: Editorial From: Drugs and Alcohol Today, Volume 13, Issue 3

Like all government departments the Office of National Statistics is coming under pressure to make budgetary savings and is currently discussing changes to its work programme. In a letter written in early April, Glen Watson, the director general, suggests reducing the number of outputs, including the analysis of drug-and alcohol-related deaths. In light of recent policy decisions and the parlous state of the nation's finance, this is a most sensible proposition. It may be of interest to some that in 2011 heroin was responsible for 596 lethal poisonings in England and Wales, methadone for 486, paracetamol preparations for 415 and khat and cannabis for 0 (Office of National Statistics, 2012; Hoolachan, et al., 2012), but as these facts have no impact on policy decisions there is little justification for the considerable cost of collecting them. Last week the Home Secretary announced that the government had decided to ban khat (Catha edulis) the mild, naturally occurring stimulant drug that has been used in Ethiopia, Kenya and Yemen for millennia, even though the Advisory Council on the Misuse of Drugs as well as the World Health Organisation have found that the risks posed by the herb did not merit its control.

The decision comes at a cost, both financial and in terms of liberties suspended. The former is relatively light and can be of course be spread, while the latter is mainly borne by a disenfranchised minority, and hence of little political consequence. Yet the decision is contrary to two government principles avowed in the parallel discussion on plain packaging for cigarettes. According to Mark Field, MP for the City of London and Westminster, such decisions should be “unequivocally evidence based” and keep a laser like focus on promoting business. While conceding that there were significant health risks associated with tobacco products he espoused conservative principles, when stating his ideological opposition to state restrictions in a free society[1].

In summary the government believes in promoting business and freedom and in making policy on the basis of evidence. Yet the prohibition of khat runs counter to all these, as the scientific evidence concludes it is a benign product, while controls will impose a burden on the public purse, intrude on civil liberties and destroy a flourishing business and livelihoods. Outcomes, in other words, that are diametrically opposed to the ideals that Conservatives and Liberals allegedly stand for.

To explain why the Home Secretary took this route we have to look for the explanation elsewhere. Not being given to conspiracy theories we think there is no one single reason but three complexes of related factors which require unpacking.

(1) Sending the message that the UK is not a place that organised crime can easily conduct business in

According to the ministerial statement the bans on khat in the majority of European Union (EU) states and most G8 countries “place the UK at a serious risk of becoming a single, regional hub for the illegal onward trafficking of khat to these countries”[2]. Last year the government of the Netherlands also went against the advice of its scientific experts and decided to prohibit khat. This left the UK as the only country in the EU into which khat could be legally imported and at risk of becoming the sole entrepôt for the trade to North America, Scandinavia and continental Europe. Perfectly legal (until July) in the UK, the green shrub turned into a schedule 1 “narcotic” in mid Atlantic. Khat is a bulky commodity, each bundle weighing 200-300 grams, and while shipping it into the US by the suitcase can be profitable for individual runners, it is hardly something to excite the Drugs Enforcement Administration. For the authorities seizing a couple of suitcases with US$10,000 retail is most of all an irritant[3]. Suspects have to be processed, held, tried and possibly incarcerated. The costs to the criminal justice system far outweigh the profit accruing to the traffickers, making a mockery of prohibition politics.

To avoid hassle and embarrassment neighbouring countries are therefore pressured to follow suit and ban the stuff. After half a century of drug prohibition these repressive policies can be presented as morally virtuous. There is a self-fulfilling logic to this, for a substance once banned becomes a “drug”, its post facto status lending legitimacy, indeed inevitability, to the ban that preceded it.

What is irksome for people who for years have been under the impression that decisions about the status of a substance were based on considerations of harm for users, communities and society at large, is that drug control ends up being driven by zealots in the least tolerant states. A prohibitionist domino effect rolls out from areas of high sensitivity for reasons relating to law enforcement convenience and international prestige. In Europe Norway and Sweden were the first countries to ban khat in 1989 in alignment with the UN listing of cathine and cathinone in Schedules I and III in the Convention on Psychotropic Substances of 1971. There was no record of khat use in those countries at the time (Nordgren, 2013). But once Somalis arrived in the early 1990s and sourced khat first from Denmark, then the UK and the Netherlands, pressure was exerted on these states to follow suit. Since then, Scandinavian governments have been able to hold the moral high ground in international drug control fora and point fingers at the UK and the Netherlands for their “irresponsibile” laissez faire policies. Interestingly, at a time of flamboyant political posturing about national autonomy as politicians promise a referendum on continued EU membership and threaten to withdraw from the European court on human rights in Strasbourg, politicians from across the spectrum are happy to fall in line with neighbours when it comes to khat.

(2) The war on terror

The second line of arguments relate to terrorism. According to the Daily Mail “Security experts have also warned that proceeds from selling the drug could be fuelling Islamist extremist groups, such as al-Shabab” (Slack, 2013). We suspect that the shadow of “security experts” serves as a cover for unsupported claims. In many ways the argument is persuasive. Somalia is a country with a high density of khat and Islamist jihadists. As it is known from other parts of the world that “terrorists” trade drugs for weapons it is reasonable to assume that Somali jihadists will do the same. The intrepid writer engaging with these dangerous subjects – drug trafficking, terrorism – has to proceed cautiously. One proponent of the khat-terror link writes about the risks of field research in London. Mafrishes are serving as recruiting grounds terrorist networks, extremely hostile to outsides and he “was advised not to even attempt to enter” (Rundle, 2012)[4].

Yet according to the Wahabist form of Islam embraced by Al-Shahab and other Al Quaida-associated groups khat is strictly haram (forbidden). When the Islamists controlled swathes of territory around the southern Somali port of Kismayu in 2010-2012 they banned khat, evicted khat traders and inflicted beatings and public humiliations on people caught chewing. In the UK too, conservative Muslims do not socialise in khat cafes but condemn them. It has been said that the Taliban have justified their involvement in the drug trade that heroin is a jihadist weapon because it is exported to Europe where it is used by the indigenous kafir. Not so, however, with khat. Kenya and Ethiopia are earning good foreign exchange freighting khat to Heathrow, but the end users are Muslims.

Far from combating Islamic terrorism, the prohibition, then, has only advanced their cause. One important gain for the brotherhood is eliminating a secular public space that allowed people to socialise and exchange information. Now that it has gone the power of the mosque has only increased.

(3) A poke in the eye of UKIP

At a time when immigration has become one of the key election issues on which a cosmopolitan, London-based party elite is clearly out of step with large sections of the electoral base, talking tough on khat helps burnish the government's nativist credentials. This is a murky politics, where reasons are never clearly stated and actions are left to speak for themselves. Interesting first of all are the objections to khat as voiced by members of the public like Terry Baines chair of the Fishermeads residence association in Milton Keynes. Interviewed on BBC 3 Counties Radio[5] he supported the ban because he was inconvenienced by Somali men driving up to buy khat from one of the flats in the neighbourhood. The arguments were reminiscent of those brought by a group of residents against two mafrishes in Streatham, South London some years back. Some of the complaints were entirely plausible, about noise at night, litter, men blocking the pavement. But when we looked deeper into each grievance we found that there was little noise, that the large congregations were not attending the mafrish but the mosque, and that the litter could be taken care by rubbish bins.

Many of the complaints were not at all about khat but about Somalis, but by framing it as a “drug problem” allowed them to be articulated.

Policy makers have to walk a tightrope when pandering to the anti-immigration lobby without offending the politically correct. Overt racism is political suicide, but opening the doors to Muslim migrants is no vote winner either. Attacking the immigrants by their habits, especially where these are foul and self-indulgent therefore serves as clever way of appearing tough on immigration. Britain will not provide a haven for foreign drug tourists, and besides, banning khat will make this country less attractive to would be migrants.

What is so deft about this anti immigration gesture is that it can be just as easily sold as looking after the interests of vulnerable Somali women, some of whom have complained publicly about their husbands, fathers, sons spending valuable resources on khat. Coupled with the vocal campaigns led by a small number of social entrepreneurs there is just enough cover against any accusation that this is a discriminatory.

Summary

When looking at the reasons behind a long running debate we conclude that the reasons behind the decision have nothing to do with science and everything with politics. Khat and the Somalis are of negligible import to the big issues of the day, but they provide an opportunity to position policy makers in national and international arenas. What is astonishing to all who have followed the discussion for so long is the disdain for evidence and consequence, as the price for this cynicism will be paid by Somali families whose members are dragged into the clutches of the criminal justice system, Kenyan farmers whose livelihood has been destroyed, and society at large having to pay for the costs of policing a largely harmless habit. It will be interesting to measure the impact as the UK khat market transforms into an underground drug scene, with the predictable consequence of criminalisation, violence and the gateway to other drug use. But since the insights from such studies are unlikely to have any effect on policy making anyway, it seems difficult, in times of budgetary restraint, to justify their funding.

Mark Field on the Radio 4 breakfast show, 12 July 2013.

www.gov.uk/government/speeches/khat

A 20-kg suitcase laden with cocaine by contrast has a street value of US$1,000,000.

Michael Rundle writing in the Huffington Post, www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/04/04/somalia-british-khat-cafes-mafrishes_n_1402933.html

Interviewed in the Iain Lee show, BBC Three Counties Radio, 4 July 2013.

Reference

Hoolachan, J., Hecht, G. and Galbraith, L. (2012), ”The national drug-related deaths database (Scotland) report 2011”, available at: www.isdscotland.org/Health-Topics/Drugs-and-Alcohol-Misuse/Publications/2013-04-30/2013-04-30-NDRDD-Report.pdf; www.isdscotland.org (accessed 4 August 2013)
Nordgren, J. (2013) “The moral entrepreneurship of anti-khat campaigners in Sweden – a critical discourse analysis”, Drugs and Alcohol Today, Vol. 13 No. 1, pp. 20-7
Office of National Statistics (2012), Deaths Related to Drug Poisoning in England and Wales, 2011, Office of National Statistics, London
Rundle, M. (2012), “British Khat Cafes: The Next Battleground In Fight Against Terror?”, Huffington Post, available at: www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/04/04/somalia-british-khat-cafes-mafrishes_n_1402933.html (accessed 7 August 2013)
Slack, J. (2013), “Defiant May bans drug in terror link: Home Secretary overrules own advisers as she bans herbal stimulant khat”, Daily Mail, 4 July, available at: www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2355258/Home-Secretary-Theresa-May-overrules-advisers-bans-herbal-stimulant-khat.html (accessed 6 July 2013)