Level 3 lockdown rules: If your drinking hole is packed, go home – or go to jail

In line with President Cyril Ramaphosa’s nation address on Sunday night, Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Dr Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma has gazetted the level 3 lockdown regulations which will see the sale of alcohol restricted from 10am to 6pm from Monday to Thursday.

Ramaphosa confirmed that South Africa would move to level 3 lockdown, with him indicating that South Africa had largely passed the peak of the third wave of Covid infections, despite some parts of the country still showing large infection numbers.

Here is what you need to know regarding the amended regulations:

Curfew and mask

• It remains mandatory to wear a mask that covers your nose and mouth whenever you are in public.
• The curfew now starts at 10pm until 4am.
• No person may be evicted from their place of residence for the duration of the national state of disaster.

Gatherings and funerals

• Religious, social, political, and cultural gatherings will be allowed but will be limited to a maximum of 50 people indoors and 100 people outdoors.
• Funeral services have been limited to 50 people indoors. Night vigils, after-funeral gatherings and “after-tears” gatherings are not allowed.
• Initiation practices and post-initiation celebrations are permitted.

Alcohol

• The sale of alcohol at retail outlets for off-site consumption is allowed between 10am and 6pm from Mondays to Thursdays. Alcohol sales at on-site consumption venues are limited up until 8pm.
• Registered wineries, wine farms, micro-breweries, and micro-distelleries may sell alcohol

Premises and places open/closed

• Non-essential establishments like restaurants, taverns, bars, cinemas, casinos, and fitness centres may be opened. These establishments will however need to close by 9pm to allow their employees and patrons to travel home before the start of the curfew. Night clubs, however, are closed to the public.
• Public places such as beaches, dams, zoos, parks and swimming pools have been reopened subject to Covid health protocols.
• People are allowed to visit correctional centres, remand detention facilities and older persons’ residential facilities.
• No spectators are allowed at the venue of the sports match.

Hotels and guest houses

• Hotels, lodges, bed and breakfasts, timeshare facilities, resorts and guest houses are allowed full capacity of the available rooms for accommodation, with customers wearing masks and observing a distance of at least one and a half metres from each other when in common spaces.

Travel and transport

• Buses and taxis may carry 70% of their licensed capacity for long-distance trips of over 200km meanwhile they may carry 100% of their licensed capacity for trips shorter than 200km.
• Interprovincial travel is permitted.

The regulations also include a set of criminal offences for those who go to restaurants, church or conferences that exceed their maximum headcount of 50 people indoors, or 100 outdoors.

“Any person who attends a restaurant, bar, shebeen or tavern and who knows or ought reasonably to have known or suspected that the number of persons attending exceeds [50 people indoors and 100 outdoors] commits an offence and is, on conviction, liable to a fine or imprisonment for a period not exceeding six months or to both such fine and imprisonment,” the regulations read.

Read the full regulations under the Disaster Management Act below:

44895_25-7_CoopGov by Molefe Seeletsa on Scribd