Protest by taxi operators in Mbombela looms

The South African National Taxi Council (SANTACO) is preparing for another total shutdown in Mbombela and its surroundings this coming Friday, Mpumalanga News reports.

This comes after the fruitless march they had on October 27, where their efforts of handing over their grievances to the premier were unsuccessful.

SANTACO spokesperson in the province, Mohamed Matola, said this time around they would be protesting, unlike the first time, which was a peaceful march. Matola said they would be joined by other structures such as COSATU, SANCO and the SACP in this protest.

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“People should expect disturbances in Mbombela and surrounding places. Remember we are working on the roads, which simply means that all the routes where we are operating around the town will obviously be disturbed during the protest.

“We are also expecting other taxi associations from neighbouring provinces such as Gauteng, Limpopo and KZN to join us in solidarity since we are facing similar problems in the whole country,” he explained.

Some of the problems they are complaining about include tenders of scholar transport and transport tenders in general, which according to them are given to companies from outside the province. They also want the government to compensate them for their vehicles that were scrapped after being found operating with illegal permits.

Matola said most of the disturbances would occur in the morning.

“We will be guided by the responses that we will get from the office of the premier for a clear way forward, but we are of the hope that things will come to normal just after meeting the premier,” he said.