Municipality to scrap illegal taxi rank

Mbombela Local Municipality (MLM) is worried about the mushrooming of illegal taxi ranks in the city and is in the process of clamping down on them.

On Thursday spokesman for the municipality, Mr Joseph Ngala, told Nelspruit Post that a number of illegal taxi ranks were operating in and outside the city. Others were in use near the SARS building opposite the R40, I’langa Mall, Riverside Mall and Mediclinic.

“By law we are not allowed to have more than one taxi rank in the area, it’s just a recipe for conflict among taxi owners,” he said. Ngala feared that they might fight for routes.

One tricky issue, according to Ngala, is that although the official taxi rank in the CBD belonged to Mbombela, jurisdiction on issuing permits was in the hands of the province.

MLM called on the provincial government to revisit the issuing process because there were taxi owners who had obtained their permits without going through the proper channels.

However, Mr McKaizer Msibi, who operates his taxi in the illegal taxi rank near SARS, said they were responding to the needs of commuters.

He also mentioned that he had applied for his permit in 2010 but to date he had not received it. Msibi alleged that there were traffic officers who were also driving taxis without valid permits hence they never gave them a hard time.

According to him, there are destinations that the taxis in the official rank did not reach and passengers depended on him and other operators for transportation to these places.

“Some passengers do not want to spend an hour at the taxi rank waiting for vehicles to become full so that they can be transported to
the destinations,” he said.

Msibi makes R600 a day and R1 000 on weekends, something he said puts food on the table for his family.

He said it was safer to use the illegal taxi rank as compared to hitchhiking because a lot of people are robbed when they do so.