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The Democratic Alliance (DA) in Gauteng calls for urgent actions from Premier Panyaza Lesufi to establish a multi-disciplinary task-team to confront the poisoning of children in the province.

This task-team should be led by the South African Police Service, and include the Health Department in the province, municipal health authorities, and the National Prosecuting Agency (NPA).

This province has seen a sharp increase in food poisoning cases involving children over the last few months who consume food bought at spaza shops.

If this poisoning is deliberate, it must be seen as murder, or in some cases attempted murder.
This is not a mere food safety issue; we believe that it is a criminal matter.

In one month alone, 12 children have died from food poisoning after allegedly consuming snacks and food bought from spaza shops.

Apart from this urgent action to form a multi-disciplinary task-team, the DA calls for the proper vetting of vendors and spaza shops that sell food close to schools. We believe that inspectors from the Departments of Education and Community Safety can and must urgently conduct a vetting exercise across the province.

We cannot understand why the Premier is not taking immediate action on this serious matter. Saving the lives of our children should invoke absolute urgency - and therefore the urgency to establish a task team that can solve these poisoning cases is paramount.

The Premier of Gauteng can and must act now, to stop further poisoning deaths.

Issued by Crezane Bosch MPL - DA Gauteng Shadow MEC for Community Safety