|
The
Western Cape provincial government, home to legislative capital
Cape Town, recently announced it would terminate an incentive
scheme for taxi drivers which encouraged safe driving practises
and curtailed illegal operations.
But due to a lack of funding it had to cancel the programme
after a little more than a year, triggering an uproar from the
taxi associations who called for a two-day strike in the city
from Monday.
There were long queues by 6 a.m. (0400 GMT) at bus stops as
people waited for transport to go to work and to school, a
Reuters witness said.
The associations were not immediately available for comment.
A bus was attacked by an unidentified person, who shot at the
tyres to stop it from operating, the witness said, adding people
jumped from the windows with a woman suffering injuries.
"No passengers or drivers were injured," Bronwen Dyke-Beyer, a
spokesperson of Golden Arrow Bus Services, which runs a fleet of
1,100 buses in Cape Town, told Reuters, confirming that a one of
its buses was set alight.
She said the company did not know who was responsible.
JP Smith, manager of safety and security of Cape Town, confirmed
there had been several incidents during the morning involving
buses operated by Golden Arrow and MyCiTi, the city's rapid
transit system, but the situation was under control.
"The buses are running and they are being escorted by the
police," he said.
(Reporting by Esa Alexander and Anait Miridzhanian; Writing by
Anait Miridzhanian; Editing by Promit Mukherjee and Mike
Harrison)
[© 2022 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.] Copyright 2022 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Thompson Reuters is solely responsible for this content.
|
|
