Spaza shop owners unsatisfied with registration process
Baradin Mohammed says that most spaza shop owners have submitted their documents to Ugu but till date none of them have received certificates or been given any proof of submission.
The members of the South Coast Ethiopian Community Association (SCECA) say they are unsatisfied with the process of trying to get the correct operational documents for their spaza shops.
The deadline was last Friday (13th).
President Cyril Ramaphosa announced a 21-day registration period last month as part of the government’s response to rising cases of suspected food poisoning emanating from spaza shops.
As a result, spaza shop owners under Ugu District Municipality were made aware of the importance of registering.
The secretary for SCECA, Baradin Mohammed, says that most spaza shop owners have submitted their documents to Ugu, but to date, none of them have received certificates or been given any proof of submission.
Mohammed says there are two forms that they had to obtain; one must be submitted to Ugu, and then an inspection must be done at the spaza shop. Then, if all is in order, they get a certificate.
He says the second form must be submitted to Ray Nkonyeni Municipality with the certificate from Ugu.
“We cannot submit anything to RNM because we have not received anything from Ugu. We are afraid of what is going to happen to us since the deadline was on Friday. If we have not received anything from Ugu, who is at fault?”
Mohammed, who owns two spaza shops in Gamalakhe and Murchison, says the inspections were not done properly, as no inspectors visited their shops.
He says another issue is that they are getting fines even though they don’t stock expired food.
Mohammed received a fine for ‘failed to produce a licence by an authorised officer or inspector’. “I got a R1 000 fine, but they didn’t tell me what was wrong or what I should fix.”
Ugu spokesperson France Zama said that Environmental Health Services has received many applications from spaza/tuck shops for Certificate of Acceptability (COA).
He said all completed application forms have been captured on a database, which is shared with the local municipal licensing offices.
“The process of inspection is ongoing, and a COA is issued only once all requirements in terms of Regulation 638 are in compliance.”
He added that the applicants may submit their documents without the COA to the local municipality, and it will not prejudice their registration on the database of spaza/tuck shop as Environmental Health Services are communicating the results of the inspections to the local municipality.
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