This is how a supermarket in South Africa deals with shoplifters

This photo of a young girl inside a cage shows the uncompromising attitude that one supermarket in South Africa has taken towards shoplifting.

 (Picture: CEN)

In the picture, Rachel Ngema, 13, can be seen curled up inside a cage used for transportation, after she was caught stealing a loaf of bread from the Spar supermarket in Ebony Park, Midrand.

Speaking to The Citizen newspaper, a cashier at the store said that the unorthodox punishment was frequently dished out to shoplifters.

‘They [the management] always do this’, she said.

‘She might sit there until we knock off for the day in the evening’.

But shopper Sibongile Mthembu slammed the punishment as ‘abuse’.

She said: ‘This is a blatant abuse because this child should be taken to the police if she stole’.

However, another employee, who wished to remain anonymous, added that under-age children were subjected to the ‘lock-up punishment’, because police often failed to arrest them.

Isaac Mangena, a spokesman for the South African Human Rights Commission, slammed the punishment as ‘inhumane’.

He said: ‘We always expect people to take those they catch stealing from them to law enforcement authorities’.