Taxi drivers lash out at car rental service over free rides

By Odette Ismail
30 December 2006

Taxi drivers are angered by drivers of a car rental company that has been offering free rides from holidaymaker’s parked cars, to Clifton and Camps Bay beaches.

They are threatening to shoot the Imperial Car Rental drivers. They are banging on the windscreens and lashing out with verbal abuse.

The taxi drivers are also using their taxis to block areas between Kloof Road and Victoria Road, in Camps Bay. This however, is causing huge traffic pile ups.

Wilma Swarts, executive director of sales and marketing told the Weekend Argus that they did not expect the taxi drivers to react this way.

Swarts says they are not in competition with taxi drivers. She says passengers who take the lift to the beaches do own cars. They have expressed their disappointment in the response of taxi drivers.

Igshaan Lucas of the Peninsula Taxi Association says he is not aware of the abuse by the taxi drivers. However, says that the Car rental service does not have an operating license.