In protest against the obstacles that they experience in their employment, the Ghana Online Drivers Association has launched a two-day sit-down strike in Takoradi.
The association has a list of requirements including an increase in charge, greater safety for drivers, and access to genuine rider information, and includes driving drivers from Bolt, Dryft, and Dropyn ride-sharing applications.
Emmanuel Aboagye Cudjoe, the conference organizer for the Takoradi sector of the Ghana Online Drivers Association, told Citi News of the concerns involved in the strike.
“We’re protesting Bolt because of the difficulties we’re having in Takoradi. We have a number of difficulties, including low price, driver insecurity, passenger cancellations, and arbitrary Bolt blockages. A driver may have an issue with a passenger he picked up, and if the passenger files a report on the app, the driver is prohibited, regardless of whether the passenger is at fault. However, nothing is done about the passenger when the scenario is reversed. Bolt’s starting pricing is likewise too cheap. They seldom consider drivers’ fuel and maintenance costs.”
Mr. Cudjoe said that clients who sign up for ride-sharing services are not subjected to the same level of scrutiny as drivers when it comes to security.
“Riders may create profiles with any username or email address, which poses a risk to drivers’ safety because if something goes wrong with a driver, it will be impossible for the authorities and even the app owners to track down the riders because many of the rider accounts are under aliases. There have been multiple incidents when drivers have been assaulted, and investigators have been unable to track down the perpetrators because they failed to register with legitimate identity documents, which would have made it simpler to track them down. We will no longer work with Bolt if our difficulties are not handled and their system is not fixed, because we are driving our own vehicles and facing all the cost that come with it,” he added.
Mr. Cudjoe, who announced that a new ride-sharing app will be available shortly, asked all riders to join up as soon as it is available.
“By the grace of God, we have a new app coming into the system that is being handled by our own patron, therefore we are pushing all Takoradi riders to start downloading The Black Ride app, since all drivers will be transitioning from Bolt to the new platform starting tomorrow,
[Tuesday].”
Source: CITINEWSROOM
