Tankers association lends support to transporters' strike

The All Pakistan Oil Tankers Association (APOTA) has announced its support to United Goods Transporters Alliance (UGTA) in their strike, and threatened to join them in 72 hours if the UGTA’s demands are not met, The News reported on Monday.

Negotiations of the UGTA, alliance of 18 goods transporters associations in Karachi, failed after which the alliance decided to present their new line of action.

The UGTA is a platform where all the goods transporters associations raise their concerns together. The alliance, in a joint statement, said that transporters are going through “the worst crisis” in their history.

The APOTA along with Inter-city Bus Owners Sindh have extended their support to the strike of the alliance, according UDTA spokesman Imdad Naqvi. The transporters are seeking an end to the overloading policy introduced by the federal government.

While talking to The News, APOTA’s General Secretary Khan Zada, voiced his support to all the legitimate demands of the UGTA. He warned that if the Centre did not resolve their grievances in 72 hours then they will have no choice other than joining the strike.

He shared that cargo handling has also been stopped at the Karachi Port Trust due to the strike. Transportation of national and international commodities has been affected and would remain so till their demands are met.

“Our strike call is peaceful. Our foremost demand is the implementation of axle load regime,” he said. He added that the notification of heavy fines against goods transporters issued this month was an “act of extortion”.

The axle load regime is the total load of a truck divided by the number of axles it has. There is an axle for every pair of tyres in the truck. After dividing the total load of the truck by the number of axles it has, one gets the axle load, based on which the truck’s load is determined.