A leader of the Site C Business Forum in Khayelitsha has threatened to force a local shopping centre to shutdown if a leading retailer fails to address their grievances.
This comes after members of the forum and the Ward 87 Development Forum marched to the Site C Plaza on Friday 1 August, demanding the retail shop to include them in the work and business opportunities that are available at the centre. They accused the centre of marginalising the majority of residents for employment opportunities.
Speaking on behalf of the protesters, Site C Business Forum chair Mthunzi Qhagana described the protest as the start. He said efforts to engage with Shoprite management were fruitless.
He claimed they’ve been engaging with them since March last year. He stated that all they need is to be part of the economy.
“We have various grievances regarding Shoprite in Site C Plaza. When the centre was constructed in 2012, there was a Site C Trust. We just found out a few months ago that it was deregistered without the community knowing. We want to know what happened to the trust. Also, we have complaints about the cleaning, security and trolley management companies that have been working at Shoprite since the opening of the centre until today. They have never changed. We are saying there must be a contract for a company to work for a certain period and when it expires another local company must take over. The worse part is all these companies are from outside Site C and there is no centre manager there. We demand to see the centre manager,” he said, adding that they also have companies that qualify to do the work.
Qhagana claimed an agreement was reached with the centre when it was constructed to employ at least 60% of the local population.
He said the number is now much less than that. He stated that their aim is to resolve everything amicably. “We came to them peacefully, they didn’t want to talk to us, instead they sent the securities to disperse us. We are going to mobilise the whole community and go there again. I don’t know what will happen there. But I can assure you they won’t work,” he said.
City Vision reached out to Shoprite through an email and numerous calls, but they didn’t respond at the time of going to print.
