AMMAN — Hundreds
of drivers who work for rideshare companies like Careem and Uber held a sit-in
Tuesday in front of the Parliament, protesting the government’s disregard of
demands they made over a year ago.
اضافة اعلان
Drivers who spoke
to
Jordan News claimed that they submitted a set of demands to the
Ministry of Transport and to the
Land Transport Regulatory Commission (LTRC)
more than a year ago, but that they have not been addressed yet, despite
promises they get every time they protest.
The demands
include extending the operating life of their vehicles to 10 years, reducing
the vehicle permit fees to JD200 annually, instead of JD400, and allowing
drivers to renew their permits through LTRC directly, without having to refer
back to their respective companies, Careem and Uber in this case.
Driver Mohammad
Abu Meshref told
Jordan News that “every time we ask to meet the
minister of transport or the head of LTRC, they refuse both to meet us and to
listen to our demands. If the situation stays at it is, we are going to stage
more protests”.
He added that “we
are considering escalating the issue, especially that every time we carry out a
protest, we get false promises that our demands are going to be fulfilled, when
actually nothing happens”.
Lawrence Rifai, a
spokesman for the drivers, told
Jordan News that they will be carrying
out protests “as long as the ministry and LTRC do not keep their promises to
us”.
He also said that
drivers believe that having their demands addressed “is their basic right,
especially in view of the hard economic situation everybody is facing due to
the repercussions of the
COVID-19 pandemic”.
Majdi Saafin, yet
another driver, told
Jordan News that the financial difficulties drivers
have been facing for more than two years, including their inability to pay
their dues and debts, drive them to insist on having their demands fulfilled
“as soon as possible”.
He added that
“most of the drivers are in debt, and can barely provide for their basic
needs”, asking why the government takes the “decision to reduce the operating
life of our vehicles, despite the fact that most of us have still not paid the
installments on our vehicles so far”.
“Maybe if the
circumstances were better, we would not have insisted on having our demands
met, but the government should bear in mind that drivers have not worked for
more than a year due to the
lockdowns and restrictions resulting from the
pandemic. This is why I can say that we are going to stage more protests until
we see that our demands are truly met,” he stressed.
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