Owners of taxis in Saudi Arabia are worried about the future of their business, following the recent order of Crown Prince Abdullah bin Abdulaziz banning foreigners from driving taxis in the kingdom after six months.

More than 100 taxi owners in Jeddah and Dammam have recently filed an appeal to the Saudi government to reconsider the decision.

In separate meetings held here, the taxi owners planned to set up a special meeting with the Crown Prince soon to discuss the consequences of the decision.

Ahmed Al Halawani, an owner of a taxi company, told Gulf News here that the meeting expressed a desire to form a committee to study the losses expected from this new order.

"There is no doubt that we all support Saudiisation and try to implement it in our companies, but such an order requires more time than six months. All of us are expecting huge losses. Therefore, we hope the authorities would understand the situation," he said.

Al Halawani said that taxi owners have decided to submit a memorandum asking the Crown Prince to extend the deadline to five years in order to implement the order properly to avoid huge losses.