Taxi drivers go on strike over rental fee hike

JAKARTA (JP): Taxi drivers from the Centris Group went on strike on Thursday, protesting the city-owned firm's decision to increase the drivers' daily rental fee by 25 percent and to hike passenger fares.

The demonstration came dangerously close to spiraling out of control as the more than 100 drivers who were staging a rally at the City Hall stopped Centris cabs which were passing along Jl. Merdeka Selatan and smashed their windows for refusing to join the strike.

They claimed that only 70 out of 1,600 cabs operated by the firm, which is 60 percent owned by the city administration and 40 percent owned by former president Soeharto's daughter Siti Hardijanti Rukmana's firm PT Citra Marga Nusaphala Persada, had refused to join the strike.

The resentful drivers hurled stones at their non-striking colleagues and smashed the windows of at least seven cabs after they were stopped in front of City Hall.

Fortunately, no injuries were reported.

During a meeting with officials from the city administration, the drivers' representatives demanded the company postpone the rental fee increase.

One of the drivers, Amri Zein, said drivers were obliged to pay the company Rp 125,000 (US$12.7) per day as of March 1.

Previously the rental fee was Rp 100,000.

"With the uncertain situation and decreasing number of passengers, we cannot afford to pay the rental fee," Amri said at the meeting which was also attended by officials from the city's Land Transportation Agency (DLLAJ) and the Land Transportation Owners' Association (Organda).

He said the drivers deplored the rental fee hike which was claimed by the management to be an Organda decision.

He further said that the drivers also protested the firm's decision to apply the new fare structure which has a flagfall of Rp 3,000 while some taxi firms were still using the old flagfall of Rp 2,000.

"All taxi firms should apply the same fare, whether it be the new fare or the old fare. There should be no difference between taxi drivers," Amri said.

An Organda official, Ishak Rumaidi, denied that the association was obliging taxi firms to increase their rental fees by 25 percent, saying that the increase had not yet been decided upon.

"It depends on the firms, whether they want to increase the rental fee within a range of between 10 percent and 25 percent," Ishak said.

The DLLAJ's deputy chief Abdul Hakim promised to speak to the Centris Group's management to postpone the increase in the rental fee.

"I hope by tomorrow, you will know the results of the meeting and that there will be no increase," Hakim said.

Meanwhile the chief of the city's Public Order Office, Raya Siahaan, said that the demand to apply the same taxi fares in all cabs would be forwarded to Governor Sutiyoso upon his return from the Haj pilgrimage.

Gubernatorial Decree No. 2503/2000 allows taxi companies to raise the flagfall and increase the charge from Rp 900 per kilometer to Rp 1,300 per kilometer. The waiting fee was also increased from Rp 10,000 to Rp 13,000 per hour.

But taxi companies have been split on applying the new fare.

Taxi firms such as the Blue Bird group immediately applied the new fares in September while other firms such as Kosti Jaya, Steady Safe, Prestasi, Sri Medali and Queen Taxi are still employing the old system.

A separate delegation of taxi drivers from Sri Medali and Royal City Taxi also came to the City Council on Thursday to lament their companies' decisions to also increase the rental fees.

Slamet of Sri Medali Taxi said that management had increased the daily rental fee by 20 percent from Rp 140,000 to Rp 168,000 despite the fact that the company was still applying the old fares.

Driver Dadang of Royal City Taxi also protested his firm's 25 percent rental fee increase even though the new fare had yet to be imposed.

Deputy speaker of the City Council's Commission D for development affairs Saud Rahman promised to consider the drivers' demands.

"We cannot decide this on our own. We should discus it with a number of other parties, including the Ministry of Transportation and Communications," said Saud of the United Development Party, who received the drivers. (04/jun)