Economic development committee calls for certainty on spaza shop crisis

By Johnathan Paoli

Parliament’s economic development and trade committee has criticised the government for what it says is conflicting messaging concerning the spaza shop emergency.

Committee chair Sonja Boshoff said how the issue was being communicated publicly did not give confidence that the fatalities of South African children were being taken seriously.

“While the issue of young children dying or taking ill after eating snacks is a serious matter, we see the province of Gauteng moving with speed on developing policies on something they seem not to understand fully,” Boshoff said.

She said the matter was a national issue and that national departments should coordinate the response strategy.

Boshoff called out the motivations of individual officials commenting on the issue, instead of a united front on the crisis.

“Utterances by individual leaders are actually a threat and a sign that nothing meaningful is being done,” Boshoff said.

The chair said