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Residents of Vredefort in the Free State are reeling following the deaths of two minor girls who died after allegedly consuming items bought from one of the local shops outside the multipurpose centre in Mokwallo.
Police spokesperson Loraine Earle says the two girls are three and four years old respectively.
A video circulating on social media platforms depicts residents confronting the owner of the store and demanding he open the shop so they can check for expired goods.
Earle says the Provincial Commissioner has since appealed for calm and for the community to allow investigators to do a thorough investigation into the matter.
Earlier this month four children died under similar circumstances in Gauteng.
Two children died from food poisoning in the West Rand after they ate snacks bought from a local taxi rank.
The Department of Health in Gauteng said three days later two boys from Soweto died after allegedly eating biscuits and drinking juice they had bought at a spaza shop in Naledi.
Police in Gauteng continued with Operation Shanela this week targeting spaza shops selling expired food, counterfeit products and contraband.
Police seized baby formula, bread, mealie meal, tomato sauce and Koo baked beans that already reached their "sell-by dates" while meat as well as pre-Rica'd SIM cards, cough syrup and snacks were confiscated on Tuesday.
The Tshwane Metro also closed down one spaza shop where people were sleeping in the same room where they were cooking food.
SAPS says the multi-disciplinary task team comprising of members from SAPS, Health Inspectors, Home Affairs’ and Brand protectors will continue to prevent another food poisoning incident.
[WATCH] Our teams have closed one spaza shop in Theresa Park for poor hygiene. The owner sleeps in the same spaza shop along with the goods that are supposed to be sold to our people. @CityTshwane pic.twitter.com/yKKgr5pWmj
— Mayor Cilliers Brink (@tshwane_mayor) October 17, 2023
Police have not yet determined what foods were consumed by the victims and inquest dockets have been opened.
The Provincial Commissioner of the Police in the Free State, Lieutenant General Baile Motswenyane, appealed to the community to not jump to conclusions and to allow investigators to do their jobs.
“We want to assure the community of Mokwallo that as soon as the post-mortem process has been completed and the results thereof prove that any specific person must carry the responsibility for their deaths, that individual will face the full might of the law,”.
