Uber just found another way to anger Mexico City’s taxi drivers

Taxi drivers in Mexico City are going on strike today, so naturally the people over at Uber decided to offer free rides.

The publicity-hungry company made the announcement on their Mexico City blog — promising their customers that they wouldn’t allow a little labor dispute interfere with their services.

Mexico’s capital — like some other cities in Latin America — has been considering a ban on the popular service, which has drawn outrage from its taxi drivers.

According to Excelsior, a Mexican daily newspaper, approximately 5,000 taxi drivers are on strike today. According to CNN's Spanish language channel, the taxi drivers are protesting against the car sharing service. 

The city’s 140,000 taxis have been the focus of reforms as a part of a plan to “regularize” transportation.

Hailing a taxi in Mexico City and elsewhere in Latin America can be dangerous. As GlobalPost’s Simeon Tegel explains, in some cases passengers risk crossing paths with violent criminals who carry out what is known as an “express kidnappings”:

Mexico City is perhaps the world capital of this kind of crime, and no self-respecting guidebook fails to warn of the danger. Passengers are taken at gunpoint on a forced ATM tour.

The battle between taxi drivers and Uber isn’t exclusive to Latin America — it's a face-off taking place around the world. We'll see if Mexico City becomes the next place to crackdown on the ride sharing app.