Violence has erupted all around Cape Town following last week’s announcement of a disruptive taxi strike against new local legislation allowing authorities to impound irregular vehicles. In the absence of this critical mode of transportation, commuters living in nearby townships have been left stranded – an issue that has primarily impacted Cape Town’s Black residents.
Shocking videos of buses on fire and civilian cars being hit with stones are circulating online following a taxi strike in Cape Town that has stretched on for more than a week.
The South African National Taxi Council (SANTACO) announced a one-week regional strike on August 3 after local authorities passed a law that allows them to impound vehicles violating technical and legal requirements.
The minibuses run by taxi companies are an essential mode of transportation for most South African commuters. Over 80% of public transportation users depend on taxis to get to their workplace, according to the national statistics agency.
Taxi companies protested the law by blockading highways around Cape Town, keeping local buses and civilians from circulating in and out of the city. In the early days of the strike, workers from townships surrounding Cape Town were forced to sleep in bus stations, fight their way onto overcrowded buses or make their way through traffic jams on foot. Protesters torched police cars, taxis, buses and civilian cars alike. Some videos show them attacking civilian vehicles with stones. So far at least five people have died in the protests.An enemy of a black man is another black man. They burn their fellow black men’s vehicles over their disputes against a white-led council. Whites won’t attack other whites over their disputes against e.g black led EFF
‘Violence affects the very people that support the taxi industry, the commuters’
While taxi drivers try to put pressure on the authorities to revoke the legislation allowing them to seize vehicles, working class people living in the townships around Cape Town are the most affected by their actions.
Geoff Mamputa, an independent mediator who has been working on the taxi conflicts in the Western Cape for years, told the FRANCE 24 Observers team how everyday people are being instrumentalised in the protests.