In recent months, border authorities in South Africa have confiscated cigarettes smuggled from Zimbabwe, where the contraband is reportedly easily accessed, driven by the country’s top tobacco production.
The cheap cigarettes make up a multi-million dollar industry, and for Zimbabweans such as twenty-seven-year-old Oswald Ndebele, who is based in Johannesburg, South Africa’s commercial capital, the health implications are the last thing on his mind.
“These streets are mean, we need to relieve stress, and smoking only makes sense,” said Ndebele, who is among tens of thousands of Zimbabweans eking out a desperate living in South Africa.
“Sometimes, I ask the cross-border transporters to bring me cigarettes. Everyone I know here seems to smoke,” he said.