The first thing my contact said about the chewing tobacco called Kuber is that it rots your gums and genitals.
I asked him, do you have to apply it down there for it to take effect?
He nonchalantly said no, looked at the busy street, and said it rotted your private parts without any application, just by users putting it under their tongue.
I met my informant, who refused to be named because he works close to where the traders sell the tobacco on the street, at the far end of Beaufort Street outside Ultra Liquors, earlier this week. He showed me into the shop next door, a dark-red building. The shop owes its colour to Vodacom’s re-branding strategy that has thousands of small trading stores around the country painted in the company’s colour.
The first thing my contact said about the chewing tobacco called Kuber is that it rots your gums and genitals.
I asked him, do you have to apply it down there for it to take effect?
He nonchalantly said no, looked at the busy street, and said it rotted your private parts without any application, just by users putting it under their tongue.
I met my informant, who refused to be named because he works close to where the traders sell the tobacco on the street, at the far end of Beaufort Street outside Ultra Liquors, earlier this week. He showed me into the shop next door, a dark-red building. The shop owes its colour to Vodacom’s re-branding strategy that has thousands of small trading stores around the country painted in the company’s colour.
It doesn’t have a name, just a tiny Vodacom sign. That and where it is situated are the only indications that it is a place of business.
For R2.50, which he had required from me, my informant bought a shiny silver and green package with a picture of an Oriental-looking man on the front.
For the cashier at the shop, the transaction was the usual simple act of reaching out for the required product. It was nothing special and in two minutes we were out of the shop.
Now convinced that Kuber was freely available in Grahamstown, I asked the informant how he knew the tobacco was dangerous.
He said it had been broadcast on the SABC 1 investigative programme Cutting Edge. He said doctors and nurses had appeared on the show, analysing the harmful effects of the tobacco.
Searches on the internet revealed that the tobacco has been banned in some African countries. In February 2011 the Malawi Voice reported that the Malawian government had banned the use of chewing tobacco in the country. According to the newspaper the ban followed findings by the companies Pharmacy Board that Kuber tobacco contained some primary elements of marijuana, and qualified as an illegal drug.
The Botswana Guardian has also featured Kuber in a story warning the tobacco could have negative long-term cardiovascular effects.
Concerned about this possibly harmful drug being freely available, the next port of call was the Grahamstown Police.
Spokesperson Mali Govender, speaking from a family function out of town, said that to her knowledge the tobacco was not under investigation and was legal in South Africa. She said for a substance to be banned it had to be tested and a parliamentary act had to be passed. She said since she was last in her office a few days ago she hadn’t heard anything.
Besides its harmful side effects, Kuber tobacco is doing a roaring trade in Durban and Johannesburg. The Sowetan newspaper and Drum magazine reported earlier this year that Kuber was selling well on the streets, where patrons believed it led to prolonged and enhanced sexual activity.
My contact confirmed this. He said that Kuber increased libido and according to what he had seen on TV [the Cutting Edge documentary], it was popular with men and women.
I asked him if he had ever bought it.
He told me that this was his second time. The first time was for a policeman who claimed it was in order for him to investigate it.
My final question to my informant, who lives in Joza township, was whether the drug was popular in Grahamstown. He answered:“It seems less popular here but you never know with drugs – people tend to hide them.”
