Pick 'n Pay in Tokai has apologised after their store was caught up in a social media uproar when halaal chicken was found packed with pork in cold storage.
The store was accused of violating halaal standards after pictures of the pre-packed chicken marked with a halaal sticker and stacked in crates next to pork hanging in a freezer was shared on Facebook and WhatsApp on Friday morning.
The pictures were apparently taken by an electrician working at the store and were accompanied by a voice note in which the man says: “Salaam ma! I am here by Tokai Pick 'n Pay. I am doing a light fitting here in the freezer with Robin.
“You see that photos I sent you, there is pork with halaal chicken and halaal meat that lays together here but they go put it on the shelves.[sic] Do you think that is right? The Muslims don’t know what goes on behind the scenes.”
The messages went viral and sparked an investigation by the Muslim Judicial Council’s Halaal Trust, who later issued a statement saying they had called an emergency meeting with Pick 'n Pay management.
SWIFT: Pick 'n Pay Tokai immediately removed chicken from shelves
MJC secretary general, Sheikh Isgaak Taliep said: “The Muslim Judicial Council’s Halaal Trust (MJCHT) accepts the apology of Pick 'n Pay Tokai after investigating possible violations of halaal standards at its store.
“In an emergency meeting this morning, PnP management explained to us that a new employee who is non-Muslim moved the poultry and yoghurt out of the freezer reserved for halaal products to the general freezer at the insistence of the electrician so that he could do maintenance work.”
Taliep says although poultry and other halaal meat products come pre-packed to the store and therefore cannot be contaminated, PnP management immediately removed the chicken from its shelves.
Pick 'n Pay management with MJC Halaal Trust
“We can confirm Pick 'n Pay Management acted swiftly by securing and wrapping the halaal products in the non-halaal cold storage and removed it from its premises and wrote it off as a financial loss.”
Jarett van Vuuren of Pick 'n Pay says he was made aware of the incident and immediately had the chicken removed.
He says they had hired an external contractor to fix the lights in one of the chillers and the contractor had asked a Pick 'n Pay staffer to move the stock so he could get to the lights.
“We are sorry about what happened and would like to assure our Muslim customers that we take our service to the Muslim community very seriously, says Van Vuuren, assuring that measures have been put in place to ensure that it does not happen again.