MANILA – There is no need to issue an executive order banning the use and importation of vaping products in the country, President Rodrigo Duterte said.
President Duterte on Friday explained that e-cigarettes are already covered by a law that regulates the use of products with nicotine. He, however, did not mention the specific law.
“You know, nicotine is prohibited. You cannot use nicotine here. I will arrest you. There’s a law. It’s based on national law and pollution and everything. It’s deleterious to health. It’s a hazard to health,” Duterte said.
“Now, there’s a law regarding the use of nicotine. I do… I do not have to issue an executive order. Paka-bobo naman itong mga gago na ito. Na meron ng law about nicotine,” an enraged Duterte stressed.
“If you use vaping in public, there is nicotine. And so without the other chemical combustion there, you are already violating the law in vaping because it contains nicotine,” he said.
When he ordered law enforcement agencies on Wednesday to arrest vape smokers in public, Duterte said an EO was forthcoming as regards the prohibition.
The Chief Executive also justified his order to confiscate vaping devices as he cited the Article 15, Section B of Republic Act 7394, or Consumers’ Protection Act, which provides that “any consumer product, the sale or use of which has been banned or withdrawn in the country of manufacture, shall not be imported into the country.”
“Why am I ordering its confiscation? Because it is thrown to the consumers and under the Consumers’ Protection Act, if the thing that they — we are importing is prohibited by the place where it was made, then automatically it is also not good and it is should — should be by operation of common sense,” Duterte said.
“If it is bawal sa Vermont, that’s in California, the protection — the Consumers’ Protection Law says that if a thing is not legal there, where it was made or manufactured, then it cannot be legal here,” he added./PN