Traffic came to a standstill in Pretoria Road in Silverton, Pretoria, on Friday morning when Mamelodi Local and Long Distance Taxi Association (Malldta) and Mamelodi Amalgamated Taxi Association (Mata) members protested at Silverton police station over the spike of killings, hijackings and robberies of taxi operators in the township east of Pretoria in recent months.

The protest came after the fifth taxi driver was killed on Wednesday night by an alleged syndicate.  

Station commander Col Karel Swanepoel received a memorandum of grievances from the protesters and promised to respond before 14 days.

Malldta and Mata are demanding police minister and safety MECo intervene in the brutal murders of the taxi drivers at Solomon Mahalngu Drive and Zambezi Road. The associations are threatening to shut down taxi stations in Mamelodi and all the police stations in the township and in Silverton if their demands are not met.

“We don’t belong to any gang and we are taxi operators and we are only seeking police intervention in these brutal murders. But  should the police fail to protect us we will take law into our own hands and shut down Mamelodi,” said deputy chairperson Steerman Monageng.

“We are tired of the killing of our drivers who are being killed in a brutal manner. We are asking police and other law-enforcement agencies to intervene and stop these killings.  

“We don’t want to take law into our own hands but if police fail us we will protect ourselves, ” said Monageng.

Monageng said they asked for the visibility of police around Mamelodi, especially at the Solomon Mahlangu Drive were the taxi drivers are being killed.  

Swanepoel said he will look at the memorandum and respond within 14 days. Swanepoel said the cases have been assigned to a task team from the Tshwane district office for investigation.