/ 26 May 2006

Drivers ‘being taken for a ride’, says taxi council

The South African National Taxi Council demands the scrapping of the National Land Transport Act and the government’s taxi-recapitalisation programme, the organisation’s president said on Friday.

”If the Act still exist in its current form, you will suffer for it. We want that Act as it now stands to be done away with,” AJ Mthembu told protesters at the Union Buildings.

He spoke after handing over a memorandum of demands to the Department of Transport.

Mthembu said taxi operators are bombarded by conflicting messages from different levels of the government.

”Some of us, because of our lack of information, think the recap is the answer to our problems. We’ve been taken for a ride,” he said.

Mthembu demanded that the department stop subsidising buses and commuter trains.

”We must compete on an equal level,” he said.

Deputy Director General of Transport Lucky Montana received the memorandum but said plans to delay the roll-out of the taxi-recapitalisation programme will not be entertained.

He said 80% of taxi operators have already applied for their new operating permits and the process will not be held up by the 20% demanding an extension of the May 31 deadline or for the deadline to be scrapped.

”The boards are still issuing operating permits. If an operator has not applied and they have a legitimate reason for not having done so, they can apply to the department and motivate why they need an extension,” said Montana.

The marchers dispersed peacefully. — Sapa