Last year’s xenophobic violence, which brought the trucking industry to its knees, could see a change in legislation governing work permits for foreign drivers.
The attacks prompted the Road Freight Industry to call on Home Affairs to change the current legislation.
According to RFA CEO Gavin Kelly, at present foreign drivers are issued exemption permits and can then drive trucks without work permits. Home Affairs was believed to be changing this and introducing work permits again for foreign drivers, he told FTW Online.
According to Kelly, there was not any one incident that he can recall that brought a halt to the violence, “but the RFA was involved in talks at various levels with drivers, unions and government”.
He said that at the time the RFA had gone to considerable lengths to educate those who were up in arms about what the members of the RFA were doing.
“We took the time to sit down with them and show them what our members were doing that was positive.” He said that had definitely resulted in attacks against RFA members stopping, but non-RFA member operators who were still employing foreign drivers were targeted for some time.
He said the situation had not been solved and was still bubbling under the surface.
