Kinshasa, May 27th 2025 (CPA).- A strike to demand the resumption of daytime movement of tractor-trailers in Kinshasa, the capital of the Democratic Republic of Congo, has been announced for the end of the week, according to correspondence from the professional road transport inter-Union consulted by CPA on Tuesday. ‘As far as the workers are concerned, the option has been taken up for a work stoppage by the end of the week, if what we are asking for is not granted.
We are calling on our authorities to allow trailer trucks to resume daytime traffic’, read the document signed by Anacler Kasenda and André Tshikoji, heads of the committee of the professional road transport inter-Union in the Democratic Republic of Congo. On behalf of the road transport workers, they also demanded the lifting of the measure authorizing trailer lorries and lorries weighing more than twenty (20) ton-Union to operate between 10pm and 5am, before calling for a tripartite meeting between the central and provincial governments and the professional road transport inter-Union to find a concerted solution.
The signatories of this letter considered the measure, which was made public on May 21st, by the provincial government in Kinshasa, as ‘discrimination’ against their road transport profession. ‘We would have liked the announcement of this measure to have been preceded by certain preconditions to protect, secure and supervise road workers. Unfortunately, this is not the case. As far as we’re concerned, given that the measure is having a hugely negative impact on work, it’s important that labour regulations are respected, and that the benefits provided for by law for the benefit of workers are respected’, they noted, denouncing the traffic congestion on National Route 1 (RN1).
As a result of the failure to comply with this measure, there has been a ‘major’ traffic jam on this road of national interest since Sunday night and into Monday morning, with tractor-trailers lined up on a strip of road stretching from Rond-point Ngaba to beyond Matadi-Kibala, in Mont-Ngafula, a municipality in the west of the Congolese capital.