The family of nine-year-old Nonceba Fafaza from Carletonville is demanding answers after the little girl died suddenly earlier this month, shortly after eating a snack bought from a local spaza shop.
While her official cause of death is recorded as unknown and under investigation, her three-year-old sister, who shared the same snack, was hospitalised for a week, where doctors confirmed she had organophosphate poisoning, a toxic substance often found in banned agricultural pesticides.
It is a quiet Wednesday morning on O Robaletseng ('Why are you sleeping') Street in Khutsong, Carletonville, on Gauteng’s West Rand. Two cars are parked outside the modest family home where little Nonceba once lived. Inside, relatives gather in the sitting room, their voices low, their grief palpable. Groceries purchased for Nonceba’s funeral lie untouched.
On the couch, Kedibone Fafaza, 33, sits between her sister and brother. Her eyes are heavy with grief, a mother mourning her second-born child.
The house is empty without her laughter.
— Nonceba's mother, Kedibone
“It has been three weeks since Nonceba’s death, but I cannot bring myself to bury her without knowing what killed her. It feels like someone will wake me up from a terrible dream,” she said.
Kedibone remembers the day it happened.
“It was Sunday September 7. We had just finished breakfast which was pap and meat left over from the previous night. I gave Nonceba R1, and she went with her three-year-old sister Boitumelo to buy biscuits at the spaza shop opposite our home.”
The sisters were later joined by their cousins and Kedibone gave them R2. This time they bought chips from the same shop. Minutes later, one of the children ran to the house, saying Nonceba had a headache.
“I said they should tell her to come inside, but they said she was struggling to stand. I rushed out and found her lying on a mattress, foaming at the mouth,” Kedibone said, her voice trembling.
“I carried her inside and called an ambulance. When it didn’t come quickly enough, a neighbour drove us to Leratong Provincial Hospital. An hour later, the doctor came back and said they had tried everything, but my child was gone,” said the mother of three.
As the family struggled to process the devastating news, another neighbour arrived, carrying little Boitumelo, who had developed the same symptoms. She was admitted to the hospital for a week, where the poison was pumped out of her system. Her discharge papers confirmed organophosphate poisoning.
Echoes of past tragedies
This incident is not isolated. It bears a chilling resemblance to last year's Naledi tragedy, when six children died after eating biscuits bought from a tuck shop.
Investigations by the department of health and the National Institute for Communicable Diseases later confirmed the presence of Terbufos, a highly toxic agricultural pesticide, which was illegally sold on the streets. At the time, then-minister of health Dr Aaron Motsoaledi said he believed spaza shop owners were using the chemical to kill rats, despite it being banned for domestic use.
Toxicologist Dr Gerhard Verdoorn told TimesLIVE Premium this week that the situation has not improved.
“I can still buy Terbufos off the street for about R10 a packet. I have reported this to the authorities, but nothing has been done,” he said.
He added that another highly dangerous substance, Aldicarb, remains widely available. Both are smuggled across the borders into South Africa.
“These poisons are pitch black, have a foul smell and are often sold in informal markets. Spaza shops use them as pesticides, but they end up contaminating food. Aldicarb has been banned for a long time, yet it still enters South Africa illegally. One in four informal vendors I encounter sells these substances,” he warned.
In the sisters’ case, Verdoorn said, “It could be that the children did not ingest the same amount.
“One in 30 people who consume Terbufos survives. Survival depends largely on dosage. The three-year-old may have eaten less.”
A growing public health crisis
The tragedy adds to a spate of foodborne deaths and illnesses linked to spaza shops across South Africa in recent years:
- 2023: four children died in Soweto after consuming biscuits and ice pops. Gauteng later reported more than 200 food poisoning cases in a single month.
- 2024: a 10-year-old girl died in Alexandra , while her mother and brother were hospitalised after eating snacks from a local spaza shop. In the same year, dozens of pupils across KwaZulu-Natal, Mpumalanga and Limpopo were hospitalised after eating contaminated snacks bought from vendors and spaza shops.
- 2025: in August, 100 learners from Gobizizwe Agricultural School near Mthatha were hospitalised after a suspected mass food poisoning.
President Cyril Ramaphosa announced in late 2024 that spaza shops and food outlets had 21 days to register with municipalities, part of a sweeping plan to curb foodborne illnesses. The department of small business development and municipalities were tasked with enforcement.
Minister of small business development Stella Ndabeni-Abrahams said during a parliamentary committee meeting in February that the food poisoning outbreaks were traced to pesticides and therefore also fell under the department of agriculture.
A multidisciplinary intervention involving several departments, coordinated through the NatJoints nerve centre, had been activated, she said.
Speaking on behalf of the City of Johannesburg, spokesperson Isaac Mangena said spaza shops are not allowed to sell or keep organophosphate or potentially harmful chemicals.
“If these are found, the matter is referred to the department of agriculture,” he said.
Mangena said to monitor the sale of banned or restricted organophosphate-based products, spaza shop blitzes were done on a continuous basis and identified problems are dealt with during the operations.
There are no spaza shops now registered with the City of Johannesburg. “However, the number of partially compliant spaza shops continues to increase as a result of the community engagement sessions facilitated by the city. To be fully compliant a spaza shop must have an approved building plan, consent use, fire permit and health permit which collectively qualify the owner to secure a spaza shop permit,” he said.
Gauteng health spokesperson Motalatale Modiba said the department is waiting for post mortem results from the forensic unit on the cause of death. Asked if the samples of the chips or other food items consumed by Nonceba and her sister had been tested, Modiba said only an empty packet was found.
“None of the implicated products were found there, sampling could not be done,” he said.
Modiba said since Motsoaledi had raised concerns about organophosphates in food, hazardous substance licences for companies that manufacture Terbufos were revoked for the calendar year of 2025.
The environmental health services team collaborates with various stakeholders during blitz operations that are conducted in formal and informal food establishments on a weekly basis, he said.
“During these operations, non-compliant foodstuff and illicit chemical products are confiscated by the relevant municipal authorities.”
‘She could have been saved’
For Kedibone, accountability goes beyond the spaza shop.
She says Nonceba’s life might have been saved had the clinic next door not been closed indefinitely since May due to sinkholes. The delay in her child receiving treatment hurts her.
“It’s been three weeks since my child passed, and I’m still expected to bury her without knowing the truth. It’s confusing; the doctors found poison in Boitumelo’s body, but say nothing was traced in Nonceba’s.
“She was not sick; she was playing, laughing. Now the house is empty without her laughter,” she said with tears streaming down her cheeks.
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