Kathmandu, April 16

Transporters have announced a series of strikes to protest the government's recent move to discourage prevailing syndicate in transportation sector. The series of protest programmes include halting public transportation services across the country and indefinite strike.

A recent meeting of the Federation of Nepalese National Transport Entrepreneurs (FNNTE) has decided to enforce the strike and halt public transportation services completely on May 3 if the government does not review its decisions to allow new companies in the transportation industry. Moreover, FNNTE has said that it would halt public transportation services completely from May 9.

FNNTE is preparing to officially announce its protest schedule through a press conference on Wednesday.

“Transporters across the country will stage protests demanding the amendment of the Motor Vehicle and Transport Management Act from May 3,” informed a transporter, who is also the member of FNNTE.

The Department of Transport Management (DoTM) has been acting against the transport syndicate since the past few weeks by issuing vehicle route permits to new transport companies and is preparing to scrap all transport committees and associations.

Ultimately, such moves from the government to end transport syndicate has worried the transporters who had been maintaining their monopoly in the domestic transportation industry.

However, transporters have been saying that they will not tolerate such one-sided decision of the government.

“There is space for improvement from both transporters and the government. However, it is wrong to assume that the existing transport committees and associations are illegal and they have been promoting monopoly in the transportation industry,” claimed Dolnath Khanal, president of FNNTE.