Gauteng parents urged to vigilantly monitor what children buy & consume from spaza shops

JOHANNESBURG - Acting Gauteng Premier Kedibone Diale-Tlabela is calling on property owners who are outsourcing their garages and homes to spaza shop trading to take extra caution in relation to items sold on their properties.

This follows numerous child deaths across the province over what’s believed to be food contamination. 

The children lost their lives after complaining of vomiting, body aches, sudden chest pains – symptoms that presented after eating snacks allegedly bought from spaza shops in their respective areas.

The Gauteng provincial government is racing against the clock to mitigate the rapid rise of food-borne illnesses, which have recently led to child deaths. 

The provincial government convened a special executive council meeting on Wednesday to consider its response to what is slowly becoming a scourge in the province. 

Officials said that part of their advocacy work included compliance checks in terms of food, disinfectants act and food labeling regulations at vendors and spaza shops. 

Earlier this week, Finance MEC Lebogang Maile called on the president’s intervention by possibly declaring a state of emergency regarding the issue of spaza shops. 

Following Wednesday's meeting, Diale-Tlabela urged parents to vigilantly monitor items that their children bought and consumed from spaza shops.

She added that parents should discourage their children from eating these snacks because they were harmful and had no health benefits.