Irate e-hailing drivers embarked on a march to deliver memorandums of their grievances to the City of Tshwane Municipality as well as to the Union Buildings on Thursday.
They were supported by BOSA, MKP, EFF and SANCO members.
An impasse ensued at Tshwane House (the headquarters of the City of Tshwane Municipality) when the marching e-hailing operators refused to hand their petition to MMC for Roads and Transport Tlangi Mogale; demanding instead that the Mayor Dr Nasiphi Moya must herself come out of office to receive their petition.
Seeing that there was no show from the mayor, the marching e-hailing operators finally succumbed after three hours and eventually handed their memorandum to MMC Tlangi Mogale.
In essence the e-hailing operators are demanding that traffic law enforcement agencies like the Tshwane Metro Police (TMPD) and the National Traffic Police must stop impounding their cars whereby they are subsequently fined up to R6000 before they can get their cars back.
They say their cars are impounded because they are operating their businesses without permits but point out that the fault lies with Gauteng Department of Transport, which refuses to issue them with permits to run their businesses.
They are aggrieved that even when they produce proof that they have applied and are still waiting for permits, the TMPD and the National Traffic Police impound their cars, nevertheless.
According to the e-hailing drivers, the whole exercise to impound their cars is a deliberate dirty scheme by the City of Tshwane Municipality to raise funds at their expense, this as the City is bankrupt financially.
The irate drivers say last year in November they submitted a memorandum to the City of Tshwane Department of Transport but have not yet received a response from MMC Tlangi Mogale up to now.
They insist that it is only in Tshwane where e-hailing drivers are persecuted by traffic officials because e-hailing drivers in cities like Joburg operate freely if they produce proof that they have applied for permits to run their businesses.
Pretoria West E-hailing Association President, known only as Wandisile, told Tshwane Talks during the march that as e-hailing drivers they have requested the City of Tshway Department of Transport to stop impounding their cars as they are still trying to sort out the backlog that is there with regards to issuing permits to e-hailing drivers.
“It seems like we are taken for granted or not taken into consideration regarding our long-standing grievances, so today we are not going to the City of Tshwane Department of Transport, but we are going to deliver our petition to the mayor and then we will go to the Union Buildings to deliver another memorandum and demonstrate there,” said Wandisile.
BOSA member of the Gauteng Legislature Ayanda Ali, told Tshwane Talks that she attended the march after being approached by e-hailing drivers who alerted them to the fact that they have been shunted from pillar to post in their attempts to s their cars from being impounded and also in trying to get permits to run their e-hailing businesses.
“The reason they don’t have permits is because of government incompetence; the Gauteng Department of Transport has halted the issuing of permits and now you find a situation whereby e-hailing drivers who want to earn a decent living and have complied with every requirement needed for a permit (double discs, PDPs PDPs, no criminal records, road worthy vehicles) are unable to get the said permits and are being punished due to government incompetence,” she said.
“This government is not prepared for the digital economy which includes the likes of e-hailing service providers and they should not make their problems the problem of the e-hailing drivers who want to make a decent living, and the Department of Transport must therefore suspend the practice of demanding permits and impounding vehicles, but must instead issue temporary permits until they deal with the backlog,” said Ali.
EFF member Tshepiso Khodibona that he is also an Uber driver and that he and his fellow drivers are being terrorised by traffic officers who impound their cars.
He complained that one’s car can be impounded several times in a single day and each time the driver wants to get the car back he is expected to pay from R3000 to R6000.
“Last year we marched to the Department of Transport and we were told that we will get a response after 21 days, but even now in 2025 we have not received any response from the Department of Transport,” he said ” The Mayor must tell us as to where we must get permits, failing which she must then stop the traffic officers from impounding our cars because it is the Department of Transport which has failed to issue us with permits,” said Khodibona.
“We are suffering, many of us lost our jobs during the time of the Covid-19 pandemic, so we are trying to hustle through the e-hailing business, but we are being terrorised by traffic officers, so the question is must we instead go and steal in order to make a living?” he asked.
In response City of Tshwane MMC for Roads and Transport Tlangi Mogale announced to the marchers that the new City of Tshwane Municipality government has been in power for only three months now and that it was agreed with 65 e-hailing operators in November last year that Thursday 23 January would be the day to hold a follow-up meeting to give progress report, stating in the process that one factor that has led to the failure to issue permits is that some e-hailing drivers have changed their phone numbers and can’t be contacted by the Gauteng Department of Transport.
She appealed to the e-hailing drivers to give her the name of their convener as e-hailers and also give her a list of all people who have applied for permits and have receipts thereof but have had their vehicles impounded.
She also appealed to the e-hailers to come back to her as soon as they had delivered their memorandum at the Union Buildings so that she can sit down with their leaders and go through the list of those who have applied.
“I admit that we have made serious mistakes as the Department of Transport in the City of Tshwane because our officials are supposed to process the applications as they come because 90 days is the maximum turnaround time for applications to be processed so when that has not been done then it means that we as the Department must pull up our socks,” said Mogale.
She promised to discuss an official response with the Mayor Dr Nasiphi Moya abs respond in due course.
Mogale invited leaders of the e-hailing operators to the Ou Raadsaal to iron out their problems so that the issue if backlogs in the issuing of permits as well as the matter of impounded vehicles would be resolved.
The marching e-hailing drivers then matched to the Union Buildings and when they arrived there at around 2pm it started raining but this didn’t dampen their resolve to hand their petition to President Cyril Ramaphosa.
Philemon Mahlangu came out to receive the memorandum on behalf of Ramaphosa and promised that the President will respond to their demands in due course.