00:00Scores of children have lost their lives due to food poisoning in South Africa in recent years.
00:05In Gauteng province alone, 23 child fatalities and 441 cases of suspected food poisoning
00:13have been reported since the start of the year, yet no one has taken responsibility.
00:19Public speculation is meanwhile running wild as authorities slowly intervene,
00:24and foreign nationals from other parts of Africa are front and centre of the blame game.
00:30There are reports of pesticides found in snacks sold by the so-called spaza shops
00:36and vendors at schools. Some locals are accusing foreign spaza operators
00:41of knowingly selling expired foods to children. Others say South Africans are trying to frame
00:49foreigners in order to have them pushed out of the country. Welcome to the flip side.
00:55South Africa is known to have one of the best food labelling and food safety regimes in Africa.
01:02So how is it possible that fatalities linked to food can happen?
01:08But more importantly, who is ultimately responsible for food safety?
01:13In South Africa, the responsibility of food safety and consumer protection
01:20lies firstly with the government, manufacturers, retailers or sellers or resellers. And then you
01:27have key legislation that deals specifically with the obligations of responsibilities of individuals.
01:35It is true that many Zimbabweans, Somalis and Nigerians
01:39run spaza shops and informal vendors in South Africa. And it's also true that most of the
01:45children in the country consume snacks sold by spazas and vendors. But why focus on foreign
01:51shop owners when the responsibility for public health protection lies with the South African
01:58government? My view is that we have an issue of negligence in regulatory oversight. Why am I
02:05saying it is negligence? Because when the first cases started, there should have been, you know,
02:13sort of this thing within the minds of those that are in government or that are responsible for
02:19implementing bylaws if the issue of a locality, provincial legislation, national legislation to
02:24say, hang on, we need to go in and see what is happening. A parliamentary committee has recommended
02:31a ban on foreign ownership of spaza shops and the introduction of a register of people who sell
02:38snacks at schools. Gauteng province now has tightened bylaws that even make provision for
02:45the deportation of foreign shop owners who violate food safety standards. But will that solve the
02:51problem for consumers? If they go, the government needs to give us a chance of subsidizing the black
02:59people or the black community to run all these spaza shops and get rid of these foreign
03:07nationals to come and make business into our country. We also are worried about an intent to
03:15page out migrant spaza shop owners and we are hoping that during the stage where regulations
03:24are being implemented, the target should not be to page out but to
03:28fix the health and safety of consumers. And that's the flip side.
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