The Portfolio Committee on Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities received a briefing yesterday from the Eastern Cape Provincial Government’s Justice, Crime Prevention and Security cluster (JCPS) and the Eastern Cape Liquor Board on the tragic deaths of 21 teenagers at Enyobeni tavern in Scenery Park in East London last week.
 
In welcoming the stakeholders and highlighting the purpose of the visit, the Chairperson of the committee, Ms Nonhlanhla Ncube-Ndaba, thanked the leader of the JCPS, the Eastern Cape Provincial Government’s MEC for Transport, Safety and Liaison, for making themselves available for the briefing. However, she said the committee rejected the negative comments alleged to have been made by the Deputy Mayor of the Buffalo City Metropolitan Municipality about the committee’s visit to the families of the deceased. Family members reported that Deputy Mayor questioned the need and legitimacy of the committee’s visit.
 
The alleged comments were made after the committee invited all the bereaved families to a meeting together under one roof to express its heartfelt condolences and to discuss other issues relating to the deaths. “The committee is driven by a constitutionally defined mandate and is accountable to the National Assembly. We don’t convince everybody under the sun before we carry out our mandate,” said Ms Ncube-Ndaba.
 
In briefing the committee, the MEC said part of the factors that contributed to the deaths of the 21 teenagers is the collapse of the family unit in our communities, saying that the majority of the dead were very young and should have been under tighter family control. She thanked the committee for visiting the families and engaging with the JCPS, as this will help to improve safety and prevent similar tragedies in the future.
 
During the engagement, the committee heard that there are many unlicenced taverns and shebeens in the Buffalo City Metropolitan area and that the Eastern Cape Liquor Board has only two inspectors to enforce compliance with liquor business regulations. To mitigate the problem in the short term, the Eastern Cape Liquor Board’s Chief Executive Officer told the committee that the board is encouraging tavern owners to form associations to assist the government to enforce compliance with the regulations relating to the tavern industry.
 
The committee highlighted weaknesses that contributed to the tragic incident and called on the Liquor Board to tighten its role in regulating taverns and shebeens. The committee then heard that there is no national liquor act, which means that provinces apply their own rules and regulations in the liquor industry.
 
The committee appealed to the MEC and the heads of the relevant government departments to learn from the tragedy, so that this never happens again. It also called for all the legislation regulating liquor to be reviewed. The committee will check the Bill on liquor introduced in the National Assembly in 2018, which among other things limits the age for the sale of liquor to children.
 
Ms Ncube-Ndaba told the MEC that Members of the committee are going to attend the mass funeral of the 21 teenagers which is scheduled in Scenery Park today, as part of its oversight visit in the Eastern Cape.

Issued by the Parliamentary Communication Services on behalf of the chairperson of the portfolio committee on Women, Youth and Persons with Disabilities, Nonhlanhla Ncube-Ndaba