Cape Town mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis stands firm on taxi impoundments

Cape Town mayor Geordin Hill-Lewis says taxi impoundments have “turned the tide” of road safety in favour of the city’s residents.

In a Women’s Day statement, the mayor also reiterated the City’s view that impoundments are “legal and effective”, despite comments to the contrary earlier this week from national transport minister Sindisiwe Chikunga.

Hill-Lewis said impoundments had resulted in a marked improvement in road safety.

“Perhaps for the first time we have begun to turn the tide of road safety in favour of our residents,” he said.

“Every time a life is lost, like recently in Mitchells Plain when six young children were killed as a result of a taxi running a red light, we redouble our efforts to make life for every citizen better and safer.”

The National Land Transport Act (NLTA) made provision for vehicle impoundments, “which is why it was surprising to hear her argue yesterday [Tuesday] that this law does not apply,” Hill-Lewis said.

“Well, it does apply in Cape Town, as it should apply all over the country.”

Discussions with the South African National Taxi Association (Santaco) had broken down partly due to unreasonable demands and partly due to the ongoing violence.

“On Friday last week we had a constructive engagement with Santaco which could have ended the strike before it was even 24-hours old,” Hill-Lewis said.

“Santaco then added many new and unlawful demands to Friday’s discussion, and some of their members engaged in violence on the streets. We then ended discussions as we do not negotiate with anyone perpetrating violence.”

“Since then our primary focus has been on protecting commuters using other modes of public transport and minimising disruptions as far as possible.”

Santaco said impoundments are crippling many taxi businesses, with owners unable to keep up with vehicle payments, resulting in hundreds of taxis being repossessed by banks.

Chikunga called on the city to immediately release all impounded taxis.

Western Cape mobility MEC Ricardo Mackenzie said the situation on the province’s roads was calm on Wednesday.

“We continue to call on Santaco to return to the minibus task team, where all these matters can be discussed,” Mackenzie said in a video statement. 

TimesLIVE