Durban – Police and Durban Metro Police were forced to use stun grenades to disperse protesting tow truck operators who blockaded the N2 Freeway to Umhlanga on Friday morning.
The busy N2 freeway towards Umhlanga came to grinding halt after black-owned tow truck operators blockaded the highway with their vehicles in protest over what they believe is unfair practices by the short-term insurance industry on their business.
Peak hour traffic from along the N2 from Amanzimtoti to Umhlanga and from the N3 towards Pietermaritzburg was backed up for kilometres as tow-truck operators clogged all four lanes of the freeway.
Police and Metro Police used stunned grenades to remove the two truck operators from the freeway. Metro Police arrived with flatbed trucks to remove tow trucks that had been abandoned by their operators on the N2 freeway.
Tow truck owners and their employees had began their protest on the N2 near the old Durban International Airport from 6am and gradually snaked their way to Umhlanga.
The protest action was organised by various black-owned tow truck operators under the umbrella of the The South African Auto Repairer and Salvage Association (Saarsa) against Telesure Investment Holdings Short-Term Insurance which comprises some of the biggest short-term insurance companies. They allege that they are only given a fraction of business Telesure Group gives to white-owned tow truck operators.
" The short-term insurance industry is worth approximately R95 Billion a year in terms of procurement spend of which only R1,5 Billion goes to black tow truckers and panel beaters and contractors," Wesley Douglas, a spokesman for the tow truck operators said.
"This kind of blatant procurement racism is systemic in the industry and Telesure has been a key player in entrenching white monopoly systems such as FAM, Automagic and the Blue Spec group which receive the bulk of the work and then sub-contract it out to mostly white-owned companies, giving a small percentage of what’s left over to black suppliers. Telesure knows this and yet still gives the bulk of its work to these white owned monopolies which flies in the face of their advertising which is aimed at garnering more support from the black consumer market. Asking for prospective black clients to support them by putting black faces on their TV and print advertising and then turning around and using that same black consumers premiums, black money, to oppress black service providers and prop up white monopolies is unethical, disingenuous and un-South African," he said.
They planned to hand over a memorandum of demands to the Telesure.
Robyn Farrell, CEO of Telesure Investment Holdings Short-Term Insurance said the tow truck operators grievances were unfounded.
"Telesure is committed to transformation and our support of black-owned motor-body repairers is not limited to specific associations like Saarsa KZN. In KwaZulu-Natal specifically, and during 2016 alone, Telesure allocated more than 50% of authorised repairs to black owned entities. Significantly, Saarsa National, who are committed to broad-based transformation and not only benefiting specific individuals, have formally distanced themselves from the actions of Saarsa KZN," he said.