{"id":1086,"date":"2014-07-25T11:00:55","date_gmt":"2014-07-25T11:00:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/?p=1086"},"modified":"2014-07-25T11:00:55","modified_gmt":"2014-07-25T11:00:55","slug":"uganda-mp-accuses-british-american-tobacco-of-blackmail","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/2014\/07\/25\/uganda-mp-accuses-british-american-tobacco-of-blackmail\/","title":{"rendered":"Uganda: MP accuses British American Tobacco of blackmail"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>A Ugandan MP who has put forward a private members bill to reduce smoking in Uganda has accused British American Tobacco\u00a0 (BAT) of blackmail. Dr Chris Baryomunsi revealed\u00a0 he has received a letter from BAT advising that the company will stop doing business with farmers in his constituency because\u00a0his bill\u00a0\u00a0has meant existing arrangements are &#8216;increasingly less economically viable&#8217;, the Guardian newspaper reported on 13 July.<\/p>\n<p>Dr Baryomunsi is defiant in the face of such pressure:\u00a0 &#8220;They thought that the farmers would rise against me and disorganise me politically, but I told them I was not moved. I actually assured them that what mattered to me was not the number of years I spend in parliament but what I do when in parliament. I assured them that no amount of blackmail and intimidation would shake me.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/business\/2014\/jul\/12\/bat-blackmail-uganda-smoking-law-tobacco\" target=\"_blank\">Read the full Guardian report here<\/a>.<!--TrendMD v2.4.8--><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Ugandan MP who has put forward a private members bill to reduce smoking in Uganda has accused British American Tobacco\u00a0 (BAT) of blackmail. Dr Chris Baryomunsi revealed\u00a0 he has received a letter from BAT advising that the company will stop doing business with farmers in his constituency because\u00a0his bill\u00a0\u00a0has meant existing arrangements are &#8216;increasingly [&#8230;]<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"btn btn-secondary understrap-read-more-link\" href=\"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/2014\/07\/25\/uganda-mp-accuses-british-american-tobacco-of-blackmail\/\">Read More&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1369,2143,746],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1086","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-advocacy","category-tobacco-industry","category-uganda"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1086","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1086"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1086\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1086"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1086"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stg-blogs.bmj.com\/tc\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1086"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}