Petrol fuel prices

The price of petrol continues to rise but commuters cannot afford a ticket hike and minibus, metered taxi and e-hailing drivers are still struggling with ...

The commission concluded that there is a skewed relationship between ridership levels and subsidy funding, which only allocates 1% of the total subsidy to the taxi industry and that covers taxi recapitalisation. We are busy consulting and we will soon make a pronouncement, but this is a resolution that came out of our highest decision-making body, which is the managing council committee.” This then pushed us from 70% ridership market share to over 80%. This clearly speaks to the important role that the taxi industry plays in the country, and yet the government is not acknowledging that,” says Malele. “The frills attached were not palatable … being asked to produce a number of things that are known will be impossible to attain. Things like having to get a tax clearance from the South African Revenue Service when they know that systems in the country are failing us dismally. COVID also hit the minibus taxi industry, which transports millions of people in South Africa every day, hard. The strain on the industry has been compounded by the pandemic, during which millions of jobs have been lost. Consequently, e-hailing drivers have been protesting largely about the lack of regulation and unfair fare structure. We really suffered at the beginning of the hard lockdown as Uber drivers.” January and February are generally tough months for business. The South African Taxi Association has said it is looking into increasing fares, given the rapid rise in the price of petrol. By the time you make R1,000, you have already spent a lot of money on petrol. Escalating fuel prices are devastating a transport industry that had barely recovered from the restrictions imposed during COVID-19 lockdowns.