The strategic session, convened by the International Institute for Legislative Affairs, focused on sustaining coalition action, scaling tobacco industry monitoring and strengthening long-term public health protection in Kenya

Ogweno Stephen participated in a strategic meeting of Kenya’s Tobacco Industry Monitoring and Interference team, convened by the International Institute for Legislative Affairs (IILA), to reflect on the future of the coalition and how its work can continue to protect public health from tobacco, emerging nicotine products and related industry influence. Representing the perspective of a health advocate working across tobacco control, noncommunicable diseases and public health, Stephen joined discussions on how the coalition can strengthen its strategy, expand its reach and remain effective over the long term.

Why Coalition Building Matters in Tobacco Control

Tobacco control is rarely advanced by one organisation acting alone.

Effective public health responses require coalitions that bring together civil society organisations, researchers, advocates, legal experts, health professionals, communities and policy actors with complementary expertise.

The strategic meeting recognised that coalition building is not simply about bringing organisations into the same room. It requires clarity of purpose, trust, coordination, shared priorities and an understanding of how each member contributes to the wider public health mandate.

For Ogweno Stephen, this is an important lesson that extends beyond tobacco control.

Public health challenges are increasingly complex. Whether the issue is tobacco, obesity, unhealthy food environments or other noncommunicable disease risks, meaningful progress often depends on organisations being able to combine their strengths instead of operating in isolation.

From Collaboration to Collective Strategy

Coalitions can become ineffective when they are active only around individual events, campaigns or funding cycles.

The strategic discussion therefore focused on a more fundamental question: how can the Tobacco Industry Monitoring and Interference team continue as a movement rather than simply as a collection of projects?

This requires a common strategy.

A strong coalition needs agreement on the problems it is trying to solve, the audiences it must influence, the evidence it needs to generate, the responsibilities of individual members and how progress will be measured.

Without that strategic foundation, even organisations with strong technical capacity can end up duplicating work, competing for attention or responding reactively to emerging issues.

Strategy provides the discipline needed to turn collective energy into sustained public health impact.

Protecting Public Health From Tobacco Industry Interference

A central area of the team’s work is the monitoring of tobacco industry activity and interference.

Tobacco control policies operate within environments where commercial interests can seek to shape public narratives, regulation, taxation, research and policy implementation.

Monitoring therefore becomes an important component of public health protection.

It allows advocates and institutions to document developments, identify emerging patterns and respond with evidence rather than speculation.

This work is increasingly relevant as the tobacco and nicotine landscape evolves.

Traditional cigarettes are no longer the only issue. New nicotine products, alternative delivery systems, digital marketing and changing industry narratives create new challenges for regulators, researchers and advocates.

Coalitions therefore need to continuously update their expertise and methods if they are to remain effective.

The Importance of Strategy in Sustaining Public Health Coalitions

One of the strongest lessons from the meeting was that public health coalitions need deliberate strategies for sustainability.

Coalitions often begin with urgency around a particular health threat. Over time, however, maintaining momentum becomes more difficult.

Members may have different organisational priorities. Funding can change. Leadership can rotate. New public health challenges can compete for attention.

A strategic coalition anticipates these realities.

It builds systems for coordination, knowledge management, communication and leadership continuity so that the movement does not depend entirely on one organisation or a small number of individuals.

For Ogweno Stephen, whose work through Stowelink Foundation has involved building partnerships across different areas of noncommunicable disease prevention, this kind of coalition infrastructure is essential.

Strong movements are not sustained by enthusiasm alone. They require institutions, relationships and processes that allow the work to continue even as circumstances change.

Scaling the Work Without Losing Its Purpose

Another important discussion was how the tobacco industry monitoring movement can scale.

Scale can mean many things.

It can involve bringing more organisations into the coalition, expanding monitoring activities into additional regions, developing stronger research capacity, engaging more young advocates or creating better links between community-level observations and national policy discussions.

However, scale should not become an objective on its own.

The real measure is whether expansion strengthens the coalition’s ability to protect public health.

For Stephen, this distinction is important. Public health initiatives should not only become larger; they should become more useful, more coordinated and more capable of influencing the systems that shape health.

Young Advocates as Part of Coalition Sustainability

Youth participation is also increasingly important within tobacco control coalitions.

Young people experience tobacco and nicotine markets differently from previous generations, particularly because of digital platforms, influencer culture, online marketing and the emergence of new nicotine products.

This gives young advocates an important role in monitoring how tobacco-related narratives and products are reaching communities.

Ogweno Stephen’s public health work has consistently emphasised youth leadership, including through Stowelink Foundation’s engagement in tobacco control and NCD advocacy.

Building younger advocates into existing coalitions can strengthen both relevance and continuity.

It allows experienced advocates to transfer institutional knowledge while younger members contribute new perspectives, digital skills and understanding of changing social environments.

Coalitions Need Evidence, Not Just Advocacy

Effective coalitions also need strong evidence systems.

Advocacy is more credible when it is supported by documented trends, research, policy analysis and community experience.

For tobacco industry monitoring, this may involve observing public communications, analysing policy developments, tracking relationships, documenting emerging products and recording community-level experiences.

The coalition can then translate that evidence into policy recommendations, public communication and accountability.

This is another area where coalition building creates value.

Different organisations may hold different pieces of the evidence. When those pieces are brought together through a trusted network, the overall understanding of the problem becomes stronger.

IILA’s Role in Convening the Movement

The International Institute for Legislative Affairs plays an important convening role within Kenya’s Tobacco Industry Monitoring and Interference team.

Convening is itself a critical public health function.

Someone must create the space where organisations can step away from their individual programmes and collectively ask whether the movement is achieving what it was created to achieve.

Strategic meetings allow coalitions to identify weaknesses, reconsider priorities and respond to emerging challenges before those challenges become crises.

They also create opportunities to strengthen relationships among organisations whose work may intersect but whose day-to-day activities are different.

For public health coalitions, this type of coordination can be as important as any single campaign.

Building Movements That Outlast Individual Projects

The strategic meeting ultimately highlighted an important principle for Ogweno Stephen and the wider public health community: movements must be designed to outlast individual projects.

Tobacco control requires long-term commitment.

Industry strategies evolve. Political environments change. New products enter the market. Public attitudes shift.

A coalition that is effective today must therefore develop the capacity to learn, adapt and continue working tomorrow.

For Stephen, this is why strategy and coalition building matter.

Public health progress is strongest when organisations recognise that their individual contributions form part of a larger ecosystem.

When coalitions have a clear purpose, shared evidence, strong relationships and a long-term strategy, they become better positioned to protect communities, influence policy and respond to emerging threats.

The Tobacco Industry Monitoring and Interference team’s strategic meeting was therefore not simply an internal planning exercise.

It was an investment in the infrastructure of Kenya’s tobacco control movement and in the long-term capacity of civil society to safeguard public health from tobacco and its evolving alternatives.