Restaurant Owners Syndicate Boycotts Smoking Ban

maybe non smokers should shun institutions that allow smokers, we'll see who is the majority!! I suggest that non smokers leave a resto. without paying if someone lights up! 60 percent decline in business is due to bombings, political stalemate, and crisis in Syria. Not because of the smoking ban!!

Work is deteriorating because of the economic situation, the polical stabiliy and the over supply of restaurents. Smoking Ban allone cannot explain a 60% drop. furthermore, a restaurent or bar business plan is not based arround smoking, otherwise they should be called Smoking Houses.

Too bad! Smoking Kills in Lebanon as it does in NY, London and Paris, and we will just have to learn to live with a smoking ban like everywhere else in the modern world.

TFEEE. The Lebanese will never become civilised. They have no respect for others who do not smoke which are the majority of people in Lebanon. They have no shame and have no idea how selfish and self centred they are. They can adapt to plastic surgery and materialism however adapting to a law which may help improve business by attacting non-smokers and improving the health and well being of the Lebanese people.

I guess in Lebanon money is more important then health.

there is a way in creating a law to ban something , in France it came after years of studies and taking other countries like Italy to create that law . In elbanon we got it in one night , without any study liek all the other laws that this government did , when you want to ban smoking , you cannot just ban it , people will suffer from that , this law should have included parts where restaurants /pubs can have a smoking areas ... Smokers are many and even in higher numbers than non smokers , why not force non smokers to smoke in that case ?

(2). What the government could have done was to bring about this law in stages and over a period of at least 2 years and allowed for some flexibility too!! It could have given restaurant owners the option of splitting their businesses into smoking and non-smoking areas and do so within that said grace period. Thereafter the government would have prepared a contingent of inspectors (as in job creation) who would go to check on the restaurants' compliance with the law, hence render culpable the offenders. Government could also force owners to display large displays with hot complaint numbers for clients.

(3). FYI, the restaurant and hospitality business employs a huge number of Lebanese citizens. It also depends on a lots of supply sources which in turn employ uncountable numbers of citizens, including utilities, security and financial institutions, even during closing hours, this industry is generating income for many. This government has simply slammed a law without it even considering the severe implications to the nation and its battered economy. In typical style it has not even bothered troubling itself with anything called follow up procedures like in the case of flexibility and the creation of inspectors. Either it is aware of its inherent shortcomings or it has been instructed to sabotage what's left of the nation's few enduring industries. This silly law needs to be revoked and changed.

(4). Already there are some countless numbers of restaurants that have closed and sent home their employees, to date well over 200 in the Greater Beirut Area alone! Some top notch hotels have already floated the idea of closure. Just how many more Lebanese will find themselves jobless very soon, who will compensate, the ministers that are already living on royally and criminally fat pays or a system that is nearing bankruptcy? Laws can never be so drastic when it comes to the economy, what we need is this: Well considered laws, time, flexibility and proper enforcement, all of which are so far blatantly missing. One view of the nation's best industrialists on MTV with Walid Abboud on Monday night should have given us all a clear and indelible insight into the sheer gravity of the situation. It's time for the economists, not the politicians, let the politicians pack up and go, they've overstayed their welcome.

they have been talking about the smoking ban for a quite some times now! it is absolutaly nothing new. but unfortunately Lebanese like to always interpret things as they like. the same way the modern world has done, so should we! Compared with population rate, Lebanon has one of the highest death rate in the region.. it is due time to wake up.zah

Firstof all, in response to some of the comments above, I'd like to remind them that this law didn't come out suddenly. Institutions were given an entire year to comply before it became enforced. Restaurants and night clubs shouldn't be a place where there is smoking, and if that's all that was keeping some restaurants open, then I'd be happy to see them close. Anyone who has traveled outside of Lebanon will know that there is no such thing as "smoking" and "non-smoking" areas in a restaurant, and in most civilized countries, smoking in public is also banned.I personally shouldn't have to suffer other people's second hand smoke when dining at a restaurant, and I certainly don't want to end up with lung cancer. Maybe this ban will help decrease hospitalization and thus money spent on treatment of such cures. I hope the government continues implementing one of the best laws they ever passed.

Ya jame3a, ya jame3a...i wrote it before, and i write again: restaurants can create 2 spaces within their restaurants: one for non smokers, one for smokers, well seperated. This concept is all around the world!!doing so, all parties will be happy|!!

I would advocate splitting restaurants and bars in smoking and non-smoking areas, with good ventilation and real separation. The one thing that poses a problem tho is that employees who serve in smoking areas are getting the second hand smoke that is almost as bad for their lungs.

Well the whole western world has moved this way and restaurants and entertainment industries have survived! all predicted the end of restaurants and night clubs... but they have all adapted and survived. all that is asked is that there are designated non smoking areas! i am against some extreme views of out right smoking bans, but enforcing designated smoke free areas in every establishment will not kill any business.

why should there be a smoking ban? they say for health? hahaha! and they do NOTHING to reduce pollution from cars and trucks and let rivers polluted and so on? it s not a mark of civilisation as some post here! it s a mark of stupidnessas long as they let beirut polluted that much, it affect more the health than cigarettes in restaurants!

there are more important issues concerning health than this populist law to try to show they are working while they do nothing for the REAL priorities....!

I bet everyone here, especially the orange peels, that if this catastrophic law took place under an M14 government, they the FPM sympathizers would be all over this place digging one accusation after the other, wlik who would be able to get them off our backs?! Their thug minister of tourism, who was in London attacked the very discussion in MTV and went off topic just like his old twit of a general in Rabieh. But it happens that they are the government that took power not short of a coup, promising miracles, and now that they are failing like rats, have nothing but to accuse M14 of everything that they did wrong. Let's see what they'll do in 2013 when they get booted out finally..

How weak are lebanese? You need your cigarette to live? Pathetic

As someone that has lived in both USA, Australia and now back in Lebanon this law is wrong for many reasons firstly: More people die from violence, war, traffic, air pollution (cars, generators, factories in highly populated areas, bad sewage etc) than they do from tobacco pollution. Secondly even in parts of the USA their are shisha lounges dedicated to smokers. For those that call Lebanese uncivilised i find that extremely offensive, considering all the problems they deal with the last thing they need is this blow to the economy. Take Budda Bar as an example, in the worse of times it never closed its doors and believe me im here on the ground the situation is not worse that it was in previous years. Thirdly in all "civilised" countries they give these places years to prepare areas where smokers can go (outdoor areas, patios etc)….

…Fourth but not LEAST in all civilised countries they look at where their losses are, for example like it or hate it Lebanon has a cultural aspect in this in terms of arguileh/shisha cafes..in amsterdam its weed and in Lebanon its shisha so why not make an acception for this. Im 100% banning smoking in other public places and restaurants like Roadster, Mcdonalds etc, but Lebanons major industry is the hospitality and for all of u saying that it doesn't effect the industry well ur obviously not talking to waiters and those who work in the industry. Fortunately in "civilised" countries young university students are not relying solely on the hospitality industry as a means of employment…

…In fact in all my times in the West never have i seen such a huge hospitality industry and thats what made Lebanon a desirable place to be. If they wanna make the ban let them do what they do in the west and give people the water, electricity and cheap/fast internet they need to stay at home and socialise and let them start social security so they can claim responsibility for peoples health. How dare the government say that tobacco is causing a deficit for the government when people have to pay their way into hopsitals even in an emergency. This is just a silly tactic by certain parties to destroy Lebanons nightlife and as we can see nightclubs and restaurants have started closing more than in all of Lebanons turbulant history. When its storming outside and about to snow and people are forced to stay in their unheated homes or stand in the streets, lets see the health risks that will arise there…

…LIKE IT OR NOT shisha cafes such as Antelias street are a social thing in our culture, those who dont like it can go to a proper restaurant or mall these places were not made for food and to those who continue to show disgust to what they call a dirty habit (shisha) well look at the west where more people use other much more explicit drugs and stay at home smoking weed and ice as a means to socialising. Thank god this is our uncivilised countries dirty habit! For those who have lived outside they will be sure to see worse habits…

…In LA there are legal marijuana dens yet in Lebanon they want to close down traditional style cafes! Plus finally most Lebanese go to these places to socialise, the majority can not afford to eat out every night and dont have the ammenities they do in the west to stay and entertain at home (electricity being number 1), so they go out and share an arguile big deal!!! Dont like it go somewhere else and leave these money making places who hire thousands of our unemployed youth in peace. With all the civilised western tourists that have visited me here, shisha cafes have never been a disgust to them but rather something they find exciting and interesting. Without our hospitality and nightlife industry we have nothing to little to offer people from the west, especially with our travel warning status...

So leave these places alone, fix the other problems that seriously effect every day life and then when the people are less stressed, anxious, depressed and uncertain then they probably will stop smoking without this useless government telling them to!

Before we worry about smoking ,how about removing all the weapons first .It doesn’t need a scientist to work it out more people have been killed from weapons ,regarding smoking it is up to the individual ,if you don’t like smoking than don’t go to restaurant where people are smoking ,who cares .Lebanon has lots of issues to deal with than to worry about some sensitive person worrying about smoking .

Lebanese should make the cigarette at least 3x more pricier then they are now. Sure, they will be upset at first, but in the long run you will be grateful. Smoking skills. Nobody else should be exposed to 2nd hand smoke against their will; it's selfish and ignorant. Go to reserved places or smoke outside! It is for the better of yourself and everyone.

2013 will be the year when the M8 coalition will be booted out of power. This will be a repeat of the 2 previous elections, where the people of Lebanon voted in majority to mandate the M14 coalition. M8 with the backing of Syria started eliminating one M14 MP after the other. To add insults to injury, M8 keeps insulting our intelligence by insulting M14 of all kinds of things. M8 has done the impossible to remove forcefully M14 from government, the war of July 2006 hence and so forth. Now that you are in power, you are so damn sensitive when it comes to criticism. You know as we know that it is the Baathist regime of the Al Assad criminal that keeps you in power, through all criminal and illegal methods. So now the butcher will go out, soon I hope, then on whom will M8 lean. You guys are finished, like it or not. See you in 2013.

Don't worry Roar, I am old enough to discern but thanks anyway for your troubles.

I agree consideration should have been given to the traditions and cultural makeup of Lebanon before implementing such laws. Coming from Australia you have the choice to eat in a smoking or non smoking place. But I regularly travel to tripoli and I'd be shocked to see places without shishas! The whole area lives on this business, it's a social outlet and way they stay sane. I do however prefer places I take my kids to like Yala Yala to be smoke free.

My Pleasure Phoenix, i just couldn't hold my thoughts in any longer. Those who think opposing the ban is ignorant are just ignorant themselves and as ignorant as our politicians in thinking that laws in all countries are black and white. Well no! Ignorance is not understanding that every countries designs it laws with its cultural, social and economical needs. You can go outside for a smoke in paris whe its below zero and return to ur indoor table, but do they expect people in Beirut to walk outside to flooded streets carrying their shisha and then walk back in? Nope, I for one would rather not order a shisha go out and have a smoke than do this! Hence is the law creating more or less smokers? PS:(I dont smoke im just a realist)

To Kanaadian, what we are saying if you care to read what i posted above, is the fact that the majority of places affected are not childrens restaurants or malls, they are restaurants KNOWN to be "hookah lounges". If you chose to walk in this place then u are chosing to be there! There has been no consideration of these places which make up nearly 2-3 thousand cafes in the country, and are a big desire to tourists coming to explore our culture and NOT our clean beautiful tree lined avenues (sarcasm) Yeh sure ppl have a right to be smoke free, but i have a right to live in safety with 24/24 electricity without certain ppl holding weapons, whilst if i drive with my windows tinted ill get pulled over and take it off with my nails! I dont see that happening though do I :P

And as a centrist, this government in all honesty has done nothing but destroy this nation. If only Lebanese people could vote for "policy" rather than "people" l balad be alf kheir! If you support what Gaby Layoun did in Beirut to the phoenician ruins, Gilber Zouein's (a sorry excuse for a woman) rejection to womans rights, Gebran Bassils private jet with the electricity money, our "improved" telecommunications & now this murder of our social and cultural nightlife then please vote March 8 next elections, IF NOT u dont have to vote march 14 but vote for a policy you believe in, God gave you brains use them.

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