A renowned economist David Ndii has stunned Kenyans after he came out to defend use of bhang in the country.
Ndii, who is NASA's chief strategist, said there was nothing wrong with smoking marijuana, revealing he had used a lot of it as a young person.
"I was addicted to cigarettes, struggled a lot to quit. I smoked a lot of pot in my youth, never had cravings or withdrawal symptoms. You’d have to smoke a hell of a lot of pot to get addicted, if at all," he said in a tweet on Thursday.
Asked by a tweep if he would be comfortable with his child smoking the drug many young Kenyans prefer calling 'vela' or 'ndom', Ndii replied: "Yes. I smoked a lot of it myself."
The economist with a PHD from Oxford University argued that the government should legalize bhang and ban alcohol and cigarettes which he observed were responsible for most deaths in the country.
"Why is marijuana (non-additive medicinal) illegal and cigarettes (addictive carcinogen) legal? Because ordinary people can roll their own joints, but cigarettes are made by big capitalists, thats why," he argued.
Ndii added: "It is not the business of the State to save people from themselves. People should be free to choose their poisons."