Soweto spaza owners back registration process

Operation Dudula members bar foreign nationals from venue

As the registration of spaza shops got underway in Soweto on Monday, local spaza owners said they wanted to do the right thing and follow the law despite the tedious process. 

The registration at Jabulani Civic Centre was marred by chaotic scenes yesterday morning as members of Operation Dudula barred immigrant spaza shop-owners from accessing the venue, claiming that the foreign nationals are stealing business from locals. They arrived around 8am and illegally manned the gate by stopping and checking if cars had foreign nationals inside them. 

Cars driven by Pakistani, Ethiopian and Somali traders who had come to register their shops were chased away in the presence of police and Amapanyaza. Some cars were pelted with bottles. 

Despite this mayhem, a group of about 20 South African spaza shop owners were seen queuing and waiting to register. On November 8, President Cyril Ramaphosa announced that new regulations to govern spaza shop in order to deal with recent cases of food poisoning have been gazetted. On Friday last week he said shop owners had 21 days to have their businesses registered. 

A 27-year-old South African tuck shop owner who did not want to be named said he was doing all this to get his papers in order and cared less about what foreign nationals had to do to get registered.

This whole thing [registration] is a long process and we are not the ones who are poisoning the kids with sweets and this is impacting us badly.Johannes Khoza

The man inherited his shop from his late mother.

“My mother died two years ago and I just want to make sure that I keep it running because it feeds us at home. What or who else is in the community, I don’t really care, I don’t even care that a shop is run by a foreign national or not, as long as we are all following the law. 

He had been in the queue since 7.30am when Sowetan met him in the afternoon. 

“The economy in the townships needs to thrive but everyone is against the foreign nationals and that’s not right, we all want the same thing [businesses] at the end of the day,” he said. 

Johannes Khoza, 60, a street vendor for three years, said he just wanted to do the right thing and not get involved in food poisoning cases. 

“This whole thing [registration] is a long process and we are not the ones who are poisoning the kids with sweets and this is impacting us badly. My whole family depends on me. 

“I have a wife and two grandchildren who look to me for food and this whole process [registration] is standing in the way, and what’s worse ... we’re not being assisted. We have been standing here since 8am and no one has helped us,” Khoza said. 

Richard Mchunu, 53, has owned a tuck-shop for 15 years. He said the process to register is painful but is needed.

“This is very tough for us. The government likes doing things without really thinking how it’s going to affect us, and it’s clear in the process they are taking us through now.

“We have heard the government say they want us to register, and we have come out in numbers, but nobody has come to speak to us about what to do and we are going to leave not knowing what the next step is," Mchunu said, adding that he looked forward to legitimising his business. 

Africa Diaspora Community chairperson Amir Sheik said the registration was smooth throughout KZN and Gauteng, except in Jabulani. 

“The rest of the areas in Gauteng and KZN, we haven’t received any other problem. It has been okay, we haven’t received any call where our members were turned away because of either lack of documentation or Operation Dudula or other populist right-wing political parties who are misinterpreting the president’s speech,” Sheik said. 

He said, however, that the registration process is tedious. He said the stipulated 21 days to do it is not enough and was impractical. He said they only started educating their members about the registration process last week. 

“The only limitation we see is the 21 days and the government's red tape and Operation Dudula. These will hinder many of our members from getting the right documentation within 21 days. But they will, and we will assist them in abiding by the presidential decree."

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