Kenyan taxi drivers remain optimistic amid pandemic

NAIROBI — David Mairu has run an online taxi business in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi, for the past five years.

The middle-aged man had registered with one of the several taxihailing applications that are available in the country.

Mairu said his business was profitable when he got into the taxi industry, so he was comfortably able to make ends meet for his young family.

“The car that I currently operate as a taxi was acquired through a soft loan in 2017. I was able to repay the loan over 18 months by making a monthly payment of 40,000 shillings ($370). I’m very lucky I finished paying for the car loan before the first case of COVID-19 was confirmed in Kenya.”

Abdul Mohammed, chairman of Online Taxi Drivers of Kenya, said there are an estimated 8,000 digitally booked taxis in the country.

The taxi trade has been on the decline since restrictions were put in place by the government to curb the spread of COVID-19, he said.

A curfew has greatly reduced public transport revenue.

“Our drivers used to make the bulk of their income on Friday and Saturdays nights. This is no longer possible due to the curfew.”

Because online taxi-hailing operators require drivers to have the latest vehicles, most of them took loans to buy newer vehicles.

“With declining consumer demand, most drivers had their revenues slashed, so they had difficulty in repaying their car loans. Most of the drivers have either defaulted on their loans or are in the process of selling their cars and getting out of the taxi business.”

The digital taxi business is now extremely unprofitable, he said, particularly because people are still getting into the business as revenues remain depressed.

The industry remains optimistic that as the number of new COVID-19 cases falls and government restrictions are lifted, the sector will regain its vibrancy, Mohammed said.

Rising middle class

Demand for taxi services rose in the past five years buoyed mainly by a rising middle class who had disposable incomes to spend on comfortable travel, he said.

Isaac Omwele, another digital taxi driver, said that since March, when the first COVID-19 case was confirmed in Kenya, business had fallen 60 percent.

“With the number of new cases falling, business is now catching up as people regain confidence in using taxis. Most of our regular clients were afraid to use our services due to the perceived risk of becoming infected if they used public transport.”

Michael Mwangi, another taxi driver, said that before COVID-19 he used to have 10 fares a day, but is now lucky if he has four.