Limbe cab drivers strike against brutish police outing

Taxi drivers in Limbe grounded their vehicles and marched to the Limbe State Counsel’s chambers to complain against what they termed, the brutish manner in which the police descended on them that morning.

The Post gathered that the police, in a drive aimed at causing the drivers to pay vehicle documents, or taxes due the Government, had gone out to Mile Four and the Isokolo Quarters early in the morning and mounted check points.

The police, we gathered, were out to, especially, fish out those taxis and privately owned vehicles that have been plying the road without as much as having insured their taxi or vehicle.

“You cannot imagine that a taxi driver will be driving his vehicle without the most significant car document, an insurance policy,” one officer said.

It was as a result of this drive that the police got some seven taxis impounded and confiscated the documents of some others.

But the drivers said, what pushed them to the edge was one of their colleagues, Solomon Vebu, who was given a violent slap in the face by one of the police officers.

Vebu told The Post that the police van had approached his taxi-cab while he was trying to arrange a few things inside.

“The 2nd Assistant Commissioner then immediately asked me to present my vehicle documents and I told him that they had been seized a week ago by Gendarmes. He then ordered me to enter their van. As I tried to get back to my taxi to pick up something, he responded with a slap on my jaw as he further ordered me to get inside immediately,” Vebu recounted.

It was the slapping incident that got the other taxi drivers incensed and they decided to ground all their vehicles.

The drivers then got their leaders to file a complaint to the State Counsel. The State Counsel is said to have, rather, asked them to take their complaint to the Divisional Officer, Seraphin Epale.

The DO, Mayor of LimbeI and the police officials later met and tried to redress the matter.

When The Post approached the Deputy Mayor of the Limbe I Council, Henry Motomby, he said the drivers did not really go on strike.

“The taxi drivers were not on strike. The taxi drivers came to inform the administration that they were ready to go on strike if their demands were not met,” Motomby said.

Asked about the grievances which the drivers tabled to the administration, Motomby said: “Their main worries were the harassment they got from the police this morning and in the past few days. The one this morning even resulted to one of the drivers receiving a slap from a police officer,” Motomby explained.

As to whether the worries of the drivers had been addressed, Motomby said the DO had listened to the drivers who were represented by their Syndicate leaders and referred them back to meet the Police Commissioner, Martial Ndo, to see how to redress the situation and get the impounded vehicles released.

“As you can see, calm has returned and the taxi drivers are now back to the road,” Motomby said.