Somali shops in South Africa: spaza stores, Mayfair and the attacks

The short version

Most Somalis in South Africa came after 1991 and many entered retail. In 2015 the Somali Community Board of South Africa estimated about 70,000 Somalis in the country, "mainly involved in the retail business sector", with the largest community in Cape Town, then Johannesburg and Port Elizabeth (Gqeberha). Its officials stressed the figures were estimates (Anadolu Agency, 25 February 2015).

Mayfair, Johannesburg

Mayfair, less than ten minutes from central Johannesburg, is called "little Mogadishu". A Somali businessman who arrived in 1995 told Anadolu there were "probably less than 200" Somalis there then; by 2015 the community board put the number at about 6,000. Somalis built two shopping centres in Mayfair selling imported and local goods, and own textile shops, supermarkets and restaurants. Some own fleets of trucks that carry goods to Somali shops in other cities, and many have bought property in the area (all from Anadolu Agency, 25 February 2015). The 2015 Wits Vuvuzela series "From Mogadishu to Mayfair and beyond" followed the same community (Wits Vuvuzela, 12 November 2015).

How the shops work

Researchers who surveyed more than 1,000 spaza shopkeepers in South Africa's three main cities found that foreign-owned shops tend to stay open longer and to price each item carefully rather than adding one mark-up to everything (Mail & Guardian, 29 January 2015; Piper and Charman, Southern African Institute for Migration). GroundUp has reported on South African shopkeepers learning from the methods of Somali shopkeepers (GroundUp, How South Africans are learning from Somali businesses). A University of Cape Town study published in August 2026 compared five Somali and five South African spaza owners (University of Cape Town, 5 August 2026).

Attacks on shops

• In May 2011 IRIN reported threats and intimidation against foreign traders, including Somalis, in townships (IRIN / The New Humanitarian, 20 May 2011).
• In 2013 the radio programme The World reported Somali shopkeepers killed and shops looted in a series of attacks (The World, 15 November 2013).
• In January 2015 more than 1,000 shops owned by immigrants from Somalia, Ethiopia, Pakistan, Bangladesh and elsewhere were looted across Gauteng, starting in Soweto (Anadolu Agency, 25 February 2015).

Sources disagree

• How many Somalis. The community board's 70,000 is its own estimate; its secretary-general said numbers change constantly as people arrive and leave (Anadolu Agency).
• Shops and crime. Some South African officials and residents link foreign-run spaza shops to crime and unfair competition; researchers at the Scalabrini Institute argue the picture is "more complicated than that" (SIHMA blog).

For the community itself, see Somalis in South Africa.