PESHAWAR: Owners of public transport have expressed serious concern about the increase in fee at the general bus stand here, and threatened to observe a wheel-jam strike and stage a sit-in outside the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Assembly on May 25 if the decision is not withdrawn immediately.

Talking to mediapersons here on Friday, public transport owners’ association provincial president Khan Zaman Afridi and Muttahida transport association president Haji Noor Mohammad said the contractors were collecting additional fee from the transport owners in violation of the local government rules, forcing the transporters to protest.

“We pay Rs142 to Rs176 per bus, Rs76 for coaster and Rs66 for hi-ace daily, but now the contractors have increased the fee without approval from the provincial government,” Zaman Afridi said.

He demanded of the provincial government to take action against the contractors. He said on one hand the federal government had increased prices of petroleum products, toll taxes and, on the other, the contractors at bus stands had started fleecing the transporters.

“It is duty of the transport department and town municipal administration to intervene and resolve the issue, otherwise the transporters would converge outside the provincial assembly building,” he warned.

On the occasion, Noor Mohammad said the contractors had increased the bus stand fee unilaterally without taking the transporters on board. He said the transporters would better keep their vehicles off the road instead of paying the exorbitant fee.

Efforts were made to contact the relevant contractor, but he was not available for comments.

Published in Dawn,May 21st, 2022