Libreville, April 5, 2023 (AGP) – The staff of the Central African River Transport Company (Socatraf) is on strike for 21 days, until May 4 in the Central African Republic, to demand the payment of three months of salary arrears and the daily transport allowances.
The country’s supply of petroleum products risks being impacted, as this is Socatraf’s main activity.
The doors of the closed offices, the boats and the whalers are nailed to the bank. At the Amont port, one of the strikers expressed her dissatisfaction, “To date, we have totaled three months of salary arrears. There, we start a 21-day strike; after going on strike for three days, there was no solution. We went on an eight-day strike, there was no solution. And there, now, we are starting a 21-day strike so that the authorities of this country move, and understand that it is very important to find a solution to this strike”.
This protest movement will paralyze activities, if a fuel crisis were to set in. For Emmanuel Koffi, boat captain at Socatraf, “It will have a direct impact on the preparation of the next navigation campaign, because our main activity here is supplying the country with hydrocarbons, so we have to make a preparatory work at Socatraf level, with regard to river units. Currently, there is no work, which means that the river campaign concerning the supply of the country with hydrocarbons will be directly impacted”, he indicated.
Informed, Socatraf officials did not wish to react for the moment. According to the disgruntled,
LNL (source RFI)
