Cabbies see red over ivory taxis

DISGRUNTLED cab drivers are to go on strike on Monday in protest at a government decision to make them paint their taxis ivory.

The announcement comes in a climate of increasing tension over the issue, with a taxi union leader who favours the colour change allegedly receiving anonymous death threats.

Cyprus Urban Taxi Union president Kypros Andreou yesterday brushed aside the threat, revealed on Wednesday by Communications Minister Averoff Neophytou.

"It was no big deal," Andreou told the CyBC yesterday.

Neophytou told reporters on Wednesday that Andreou had received death threats over the phone because he backed the Ministry colour scheme.

But Andreou said yesterday he had not seen the phone call as a real threat to his life. "The anonymous phone call was more a strict recommendation," he said.

"(The Minister) used this revelation to give certain impressions and to give credence to his inexcusable (comments)."

On Tuesday, Neophytou launched a virulent attack on taxi drivers operating out of Larnaca airport, describing them as "murderers, drug addicts and people of the night."

Taxi drivers affiliated to the Povek union are set to strike for 12 hours on Monday, along with other drivers who oppose the Ministry’s colour plan.

A representative from the union yesterday told the Cyprus Mail that the strike would start early in the morning and would last 12 hours.

The Ministry says the colour change is an effort to bring Cypriot taxis in line with their European counterparts.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.