POLL | The EFF will march to Sahpra on Friday — do you support the protest?

The EFF will on Friday march to the offices of the SA Health Products Regulatory Authority (Sahpra) to demand that the regulator approves more Covid-19 jabs including the Russian Sputnik V and Chinese Sinovac vaccines. 

Dubbed as the “march to save lives” by party leader Julius Malema, the picket action seeks to pressure the regulator and the government to approve more jabs to speed up the vaccine rollout.

Malema made the announcement on Youth Day. 

“Friday, we are at Sahpra [SA Health Products Regulatory Authority]. We want the Sputnik V and Sinovac vaccines. Failure to do so we are going to sleep outside the home of the CEO of Sahpra. It is personal like that. There will be a sleep-in at the CEO's house until the vaccines are provided by this government,” said Malema.

The DA said on Wednesday it received an invitation from the red berets to join the protest but the party declined on the basis that doing so would be “to endorse the deeply irresponsible actions of the EFF who are placing the lives of South Africans in danger through a super-spreader event”.

The firebrand leader and his party have been at the receiving end of criticism for hosting mass gatherings amid a surge in Covid-19 infections in Gauteng. 

On Monday, Sahpra said the evaluation of more vaccines is at an advanced stage.

“Sahpra has approved the AstraZeneca, Pfizer and the J&J vaccines. Sahpra has also received applications for CoronaVac (manufactured by Sinovac) and the Sputnik V (manufactured by the Gamaleya Research Institute) vaccines.

“The evaluation of the CoronaVac application is at a very advanced stage. Furthermore, reports recently made available by the WHO that articulate the basis for the emergency use listing for CoronaVac are being considered,” the regulator said. 

On Wednesday, the regulator said it received the documentation for the Sinopharm vaccine and will begin its evaluation of the data to assess its efficacy.