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Taxi strike Uitenhage.
Several months after the collapse of the Matanzima Road bridge, the town is still in chaos with early morning traffic disrupting taxi routes, costing the taxi industry thousands as the alternative route is a gravel road which deteriorates the state of the vehicles.
Uitenhage District Taxi Association Spokesperson, Lubabalo Vesele, says their daily trips have been reduced, affecting their daily income,
“The impact of the bridge in our business is huge. We no longer have peak hour now in which we had five trips between 5am and 10am. The maximum is now two trips. Also, the road we now use is gravel, which affects the conditions of the taxis. We now have to constantly change tyres. The gravel road is bad,” says Vesele.
Residents have voiced their frustrations about the delay of building a new bridge.
“This is not right. You see, now I have to walk to town because of this strike. The municipality must just fix the bridge. It is long overdue,” says one of the angry residents.
“People are unable to go to work and this did not start from today. The municipality should have fixed the bridge a long time ago. This was also short notice. So, it caught us off guard,” says another resident.
The Nelson Mandela Metro Municipality was allocated R89 million for flood-damage repairs.
Executive Mayor, Babalwa Lobishe says R44 million of this budget has already been spent, in which a contractor is expected to commence with the Matanzima road bridge.
“The bridge is allocated within the R89 million (flood damaged budget) and the project is assumed can only be completed in nine to 10 months, but we will see how the companies exercise their speediness in the process because within the Jubilee Bridge and the other bridge, they took less time because they worked extra hours. So, it can take a shorter time,” says Lobishe.
The strike is now on hold as the municipality is expected to award a new contractor on Friday.
