The instigators of the Bogota transit strike said Tuesday that they have not reached an agreement with the Bogota Mayor’s Office and they will continue the strike until their demands are met.
Bogota Mayor Samuel Moreno announced earlier today that his office had negotiated with some of the bus drivers involved to end to the strike. Moreno said they had reached an agreement that some 3,000 buses would return to normal service from 12 PM today.
However the Association of Small Transporters (Apetrans) who called the strike on Monday, stressed that the strike has not been called off.
Alfonso Perez, president of Apetrans, said that the drivers of 16,500 buses will not return to work until their demands are met, despite threats from Moreno that they may have their legal permits revoked.
Perez added that any drivers who agreed to return to work are not affiliated with Apetrans.
Bogota Secretary of Mobility Fernando Alvarez claimed that almost 35 bus routes had returned to normal service. He said that the routes belonged to ten businesses that had decided to return to the streets.
Marco Tulio Gutierrez, the president of transport company Conaltur, said that Bogota had not been paralyzed by a strike but that rather its public order had been attacked and its vehicles vandalized.
“The strike is an instrument that in this case has been used wrongly,” Gutierrez said.
Alvarez stressed that the way was still open for Apetrans to return to the bargaining table.