The head of the National Council for Overland Transportation, or CNTT, announced on Thursday the end of a national passenger and cargo transportation strike after reaching an agreement with Peru’s government. The transportation union began their national strike on Tuesday following an increase in fuel prices and demanded, among other things, a 100 percent reduction in a diesel tax.
After negotiations with Peru’s cabinet chief, Javier Velásquez, and the Minister of Transportation and Communications, Enrique Cornejo, the CNTT accepted an agreement that will reduce the diesel tax by 30 percent, daily La República reported.
“I would like to say that with this agreement we are lifting our protest,” said the president of the transportation union, Alfonso Rivas. “We understand that our fellow residents are suffering and that through tourists who visit our country we are presenting a bad image abroad. All of this influenced our decision to lift the strike.”
Some 4,200 inter-provincial buses and 120,000 cargo trucks were removed from Peru’s highways by Wednesday as part of the strike, causing the government to announce a state of emergency on some of the country’s highway networks. In Arequipa, Peru’s second largest city and a popular tourist destination, about 1,500 tourists were reportedly stranded due to the lack of transportation.
