Informal traders in Nelson Mandela Bay in the Eastern Cape are trying to find a way to survive by quietly going door-to-door selling goods in spite of lockdown rules
Municipal spokesperson Mtubanzi Mniki said only informal traders who had permits before the lockdown and who sold uncooked food, could be granted Covid-19 trading permits. He said permits were not issued to informal traders selling goods house-to-house as this would be in direct contravention of current lockdown regulations.
One trader buys blankets in Johannesburg for resale in Motherwell. He goes door-to-door and gives customers three months to pay. He has been in the business for 15 years and usually would do brisk sales with the approach of winter, he says. To get round the prohibition on door-to-door selling during lockdown, he goes round with only a brochure. “If I get an order I go back home to collect one blanket at a time.”
He says police are watching and there are roadblocks, but “as traders we have to feed our families without spreading the disease. I practise safe social distancing and I always wear my mask when in public. I can’t sit at home while my family is starving ... There is no money to buy food and we don’t have cash to pay for our rent.”
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