In what has become a recurring nightmare for New York City transport workers, a city cab driver was found dead in his apartment at the weekend. Abdul Saleh was the sixth struggling cabbie to commit suicide in eight months.
Saleh, 59, a Yemeni immigrant who for 30 years spent 12 hours a day behind the wheel, was found hanged in his Flatlands apartment on King’s Highway at 9 a.m, Friday.
‘He should have been planning for retirement and rest after 30 years of serving the public and the city, but instead he was exhausted by the cruelty of ending each 12-hour workday with less in his pocket than the day before,’ Bhairavi Desai, director of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance, told the Daily News.
Ex-business partner, Qamar Chaudhary who shared the cost of the taxi lease and medallion revealed that Saleh was having trouble making his part of the payments.
Chaudhary, 36, who now drives for Uber says  ‘[Saleh] was short here and there, and I used to have to help him out. He said he didn’t know how to survive.’
Moving to Uber meant Saleh was left without a driving partner. Chaudry said he spoke to his former partner  earlier this week and ‘He sounded upset and depressed,’ Chaudhary told the Post. ‘He said he didn’t feel good.’
And on Friday, a roommate found him. He had hanged himself with an electrical cord.
He was single, but had family back in Yemen.

Saleh is the latest of several cab drivers to commit suicide in the face of the financial strain of driving a taxi in New York City.
Cab drivers have been struggling, and many blame the rise of services like Uber and Lyft for taking their business.  The cabbies say there are too many cars on the street, from companies like Uber and Lyft, for them to make a living wage.