Boda boda riders in Juba have expressed concern after they say they were told to pay fifty pounds a month to the South Sudan Boda Boda Association.

Collection of the fees has already started on the city streets, although some boda boda riders said that they are not informed of the purpose for the new payments.

“The fifty pounds they are collecting, I do not know why they are collecting,” one boda boda rider told Eye Radio. “And they are saying it is for the city council, but this not.”

Another rider said, “We have work as boda boda for quite a long time, and we are failing to know how that money is being used. Every time the association is coming with order that is hard to understand”

Another rider said that the collection agents are aggressive, removing the ignition keys from the bikes and then ordering the riders to pay up.  “This order is like robbing; they just come and pick your keys. If it is tax that is not the way it is done. For these guys to remove our keys …why? How will I know these people? If you refuse they will take your bike, and this people do not have proper identity card what if they lost they bike how shall we get it”.

“As citizens we should also contribute revenue to the government,” says Abraham Jok, the chairperson for the Boda Boda Association. “The fifty pounds payment is a tax that will be paid to the government. If something is taken from somebody with the receipt, it means at the end of the day the association is remitting to the government.”

Mr. Jok said that there was “no point complaining” about tax being paid.

“These are citizens who fail to understand how they are operating in their own land,” he said.  “A tax is taken from somebody and pension but this money which is being taken, is for the benefit of their office and the benefit of him to be on the road and he is like paying his government.”