Making headlines:; ANC welcomes recall of products linked to listeriosis outbreak; ConCourt set to hear Sassa case on CPS contract extension; And, IEC says KZN has highest number of incomplete addresses on voters' roll

For Creamer Media in Johannesburg, I’m Jessica Oosthuizen.

ANC welcomes recall of products linked to listeriosis outbreak

The ANC has welcomed the recall of products that have been linked to the outbreak of listeriosis and has called for an investigation.

ANC spokesperson Pule Mabe yesterday said in a statement that the ANC has called on the South African Bureau of Standards to urgently initiate an investigation at various identified food production factories to establish whether the packaging material used in those products was substandard and to ensure that it conformed to the basic standards of hygiene.

The Department of Health announced on Sunday that the outbreak had been traced to an Enterprise Foods facility in Polokwane. The disease has claimed 180 lives in South Africa and is the biggest so far in the world, according to the World Health Organisation.

South African retailers recalled several Enterprise and Rainbow Chicken products and customers were offered refunds yesterday following the announcement.

ConCourt set to hear Sassa case on CPS contract extension

The Constitutional Court is today expected to hear an application by the South African Social Security Agency to extend the Cash Paymaster Services contract by six months.

Roughly 2.5-million beneficiaries will not get their grant payments if the contract with CPS is not extended, the agency argued in court papers.

This contract expires on March 31.

Sassa's concern is for the 29% of grant beneficiaries, most of whom live in rural areas and depend on cash deliveries of their social grants, a service that is currently provided by CPS.

Last Wednesday, acting CEO Pearl Bhengu and new Social Development Minister Susan Shabangu appeared in Parliament to update MPs on Sassa and the department's state of readiness to migrate the nation's social grants scheme from CPS by April 1.

And, IEC says KZN has highest number of incomplete addresses on voters' roll

KwaZulu-Natal has the highest number of incomplete addresses on the Electoral Commission of South Africa voters' roll, officials said yesterday.

There are almost 1.4-million incomplete addresses for the 5.3-million registered voters in the province, with 291 005 coming from eThekwini Metro alone.

The closest to the metro's outstanding address figure is Umgungundlovu District Municipality at 41 000 incomplete addresses.

The drive for voter registrations addresses comes after the Constitutional Court in 2016 ruled that the IEC must obtain sufficient particulars of the location of voters by the end of June this year.

Provincial Electoral Officer Mawethu Mosery met with journalists at the IEC offices in Westville, Durban, where he announced voter registration for the 2019 general elections would be opened.

That’s a roundup of news making headlines today
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