Africa-Press – South-Africa. The Western Cape government and the City of Cape Town have convinced taxi bosses to call off the mass strike action planned for Wednesday.
On Tuesday, the provincial government and City officials were locked in discussions with the South African National Taxi Council (Santaco) in a bid to prevent the shutdown.
Premier Alan Winde and the newly appointed MEC of Mobility, Ricardo Mackenzie, met with the leadership of Santaco, which resulted in the withdrawal of the planned minibus taxi industry stay-away that had been scheduled for Wednesday.
The meeting committed to ongoing engagements between the government and the industry in a special task team.
The engagement was set up by Mackenzie as his first order of business as MEC.
The meeting included Santaco representatives from across the province, Winde, Cape Town Mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis and members of the provincial and City governments.”We need to find a way forward together to reach a sustainable solution to the grievances raised by the council,” Winde said.
“We must all ensure our residents come first and that they can move around safely and reliably.”
Taxi operators were initially advised to park their taxis at home or at a rank as part of the shutdown. Among some of Santaco’s concerns was the “continued unfair impoundment of minibus taxis for minor traffic violations by drivers”.
It referenced a recent decision by the City to lift a moratorium on metered taxi operating licences, which opened up more than 2 000 new operating licences for e-hailing providers, while there was “to be a five-year moratorium on minibus taxi operating licences,” the organisation said.
Santaco said it was challenging the City’s decision to allow the Golden Arrow Bus Services to continue operating on the notorious B97 route.
The route was reopened to taxis in December after a deadly dispute saw it closed for several months.
In a brief statement issued after the strike was called off, Santaco confirmed the strike is called off.
The province had recently seen several days of taxi disruptions, with thousands of pupils prevented from attending school due to a dispute between operators and the Western Cape education department.
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