Rabat’s Eco-Friendly Bicycle Taxi Initiative Fails to Gain Traction

Considered at the outset as ecological tourist transport means in the capital, these motorcycles were supposed to provide young beneficiaries with a stable income. Unfortunately, these vehicles, real "piles of scrap metal" from China, soon disappointed the authorities and the beneficiaries.

Although the first beneficiaries of the project had warned the authorities of the poor quality of these machines, which were not worth their exorbitant purchase price, no investigation was opened on the bicycle taxi market, presented to the king in January 2019, and which nevertheless cost 2.5 million dirhams to the Moroccan Treasury.

Two months after their introduction, mechanical breakdowns and hidden defects began to emerge. According to Al Massae, the electric motors of these bicycle taxis frequently catch fire, and the battery life is low. As a result, the beneficiaries find themselves spending entire days without earning the slightest income. To top it off, these young people, who had been waiting for years to benefit from it, had to give them up, without condition, to other operators, after having long demanded the replacement of the defective vehicles.

Faced with this financial drama, the government has remained deaf to the many calls of the National Authority for the Protection of Public Property. According to the latest news, these tricycles cost 50,000 dirhams each, while in global sales centers, the value of a similar vehicle does not exceed 9,000 dirhams.