OT­TO CAR­RING­TON

Se­nior Re­porter

ot­to.car­ring­ton@cnc3.co.tt

The taxi and maxi taxi dri­vers’ as­so­ci­a­tions are call­ing for po­lice pro­tec­tion for their mem­bers while they car­ry out their du­ties.

The call came af­ter am­putee and taxi dri­ver Dense­ly Eu­dovic, who was re­port­ed miss­ing, was found dead in Biche.

His body was in an ad­vanced state of de­com­po­si­tion.

Eu­dovic, 40, of Ve­ga de Oropouche, was found with his feet and hands bound on Sun­day.

The dis­cov­ery was made one day af­ter TT RideShare dri­ver Sha­keem Charles was found dead in Pe­nal. Charles was al­so re­port­ed miss­ing.

Speak­ing to Guardian Me­dia yes­ter­day, Adri­an Da Cos­ta, pres­i­dent of the Trinidad and To­ba­go Taxi Dri­vers Net­work, said crime was af­fect­ing their liveli­hoods.

“There are many in­stances where in­ci­dents hap­pen, re­ports are made, and not much comes out of it. They end up in the me­dia, in the pa­per, but of­ten just fall flat. I’ve had in­stances where com­rades have come to me say­ing peo­ple tried to rob them, but they didn’t suc­ceed, they tried though,” he ex­plained.

He said it was ter­ri­fy­ing for taxi dri­vers, es­pe­cial­ly at night.

“Most of the guys choose not to work at night be­cause it has got­ten out of hand and a lot riski­er for us. The demons come out at night,” Da Cos­ta added.

Maxi taxi dri­vers are al­so afraid.

Eon He­witt, pres­i­dent of the As­so­ci­a­tion of Maxi Taxi Dri­vers, said his mem­bers are un­der at­tack. He said the two most re­cent in­ci­dents are ex­am­ples of the ter­ror they con­stant­ly face.

“Some years ago, peo­ple may re­call a maxi was hi­jacked and tak­en off the road, which is es­sen­tial­ly kid­nap­ping. Each and every one of us was robbed, and that just seemed to be over­looked. It hurts, you know. It’s be­com­ing a re­al­i­ty be­cause it hap­pened be­fore. It wasn’t just a pass­ing in­ci­dent. It’s be­com­ing des­per­ate,” He­witt ex­plained.

He added the time has come for se­ri­ous di­a­logue on how dri­vers can be pro­tect­ed.

“Route 2 has a lot of polic­ing...(But) Our dri­vers have been beat­en, shot, and trag­i­cal­ly, some have been killed. The ques­tion aris­es: what do we do next? Should we arm our­selves? And with what? How can we know who might come to rob us? It’s in­cred­i­bly chal­leng­ing. We need to come to­geth­er and dis­cuss this se­ri­ous­ly,” He­witt said.