City traders demand compensation
INFORMAL traders in Durban have demanded compensation from the government for the losses they incurred during the first week of the lockdown.
The traders said they had lost thousands of rand after the government prevented them from doing business during the pension payout period last week.
Traders, who started to open their shops on the streets of the Durban CBD yesterday, said it was only fair for the government to consider compensating them for the losses incurred during the lockdown period.
Announcing the new amendments of the Covid-19 regulations, Co-operative Governance and Traditional Affairs (Cogta) Minister Nkosazana Dlamini Zuma said that after careful consideration they realised spaza shops were supposed to remain open during the lockdown.
In her speech last week, Dlamini Zuma said informal food traders would also be allowed to open provided they received a permit from their ward councillors or their municipality.
One of the traders, Nokuphiwa Magwaza, said month-end and the grant payout period was when they make a lot of money for their families.
Magwaza said during that period, she made more than R3 000 profit in one week. “I had just bought stock because people were about to be paid. Everything got rotten and I had to throw it away. My five children and my mother survive through the money I make here.”
She said that even though there were only a handful of people in the CBD, she was optimistic she would make some money.
“Even if I can make just R100 as a profit, I would be happy. It would be better than nothing,” she said.
Another street vendor, Thando Nxasana, said that after the relaxation of the regulations, he had to borrow money to restock in order to operate.
The chairperson for the Committee for the Promotion and Advancement of Cooperatives, Vishwas Satgar, said they supported informal traders’ and street vendors’ call for compensation.
“It’s only fair. We stand with them, and the government should have engaged with the informal traders’ associations to ensure that they were also involved in future regulations.”
Nomusa Dube-Ncube, KwaZulu-Natal MEC for Economic Development, said this week that she would announce a series of interventions aimed to stimulate the economy and assist emerging entrepreneurs over the next few months.
She said the main focus would be to turn around the situation in response to the devastating impact caused by the outbreak of the virus.
“We understand that small players such as co-operatives, informal traders such as street traders have been badly affected.
“We undertake not to leave small players behind as they play a critical role in our economy,” she said.
Dube-Ncube said the interventions to be announced were primarily aimed at bridging the widening gap between the first and second economies.