Colombia raises sanctions against unregulated transport apps

Eleven points on the roads of the Colombian capital were blocked in the early hours of Tuesday by dozens of drivers of transport technology platforms in protest of a bill that the government is preparing and that, they allege, could affect the union.

The public document, which has not yet been presented to Congress for discussion, contemplates imposing sanctions on technological platforms that do not have the authorization of the transport authority. Among them, ordering internet service providers to temporarily disconnect applications, fines for users and drivers, and immobilization of vehicles for up to three months.

Colombia has been in the middle of the debate for years on how to regulate platforms such as Uber, Didi or Cabify, which are dedicated to the intermediation of urban transport in private vehicles. A sector of taxi drivers claims unequal competition when considering them “illegal”.

“We are at the moment of greatest setback in the discussion in the last eight years”, José Daniel López, executive director of Alianza In, which represents the applications union, assured The Associated Press.

López maintains that, although the great pending in Colombia is the regulation of the platforms, the bill does not seek to settle it but rather tries in practice “ban them” by establishing that there are authorized services, such as taxis, and other unauthorized ones, such as private cars that provide services on mobility platforms and to which the sanctioning regime of blocking and fines would be activated.

Alianza In expressed their disagreement to the government through a letter in which they warned that, if not modified, the bill would lead to the “unviability of this industry”, which would affect 100,000 Colombians who generate income from mobility applications and 230,000 taxi drivers who use them to work.

Faced with the protest of the drivers of the mobility platforms, the Minister of Transportation, Guillermo Reyes, announced that he will listen to the union at a work table on Wednesday to advance the construction of the bill.

Reyes said in an interview with Blu Radio that they do not intend to ban the platforms, but they do intend to get them to provide the service in the “framework of law” and that they comply with rules similar to those of taxi drivers who have, for example, a membership and insurance system.

Source: Associated Press