By Nathaniel NarteyFacebook: Nathaniel NarteyTwitter: @Annertey_Nartey
Stakeholders in the road construction and maintenance sector have called for an increase in the road toll to generate adequate funds to construct new roads and maintain existing ones.
The stakeholders have agreed that the current road toll is woefully inadequate.
In an interview, the Acting CEO of the Ghana Highways Authority, Christian Nti, said the current amount charged as road toll is inadequate to maintain and expand the roads and this affects traffic in areas where there are toll booths.
“The money that we are paying now is entirely inadequate to be able to maintain the road. For example you see an articulator loaded with thousands of bags of cement and will wait and pay 2cedis or 3 cedis and the damage that he is causing on the road is immeasurable. And at times because of the limited fees, we are not able to develop the toll booth to make it very functional. That is the service of the , the level of service to be able to move, traffic as much as possible”.
President of the Road Contractors Association, John Afful, shared similar sentiments. He appealed for an increase in the road toll from the current rate to ₵2.00 for saloon cars and to ₵ 3.00 for bigger vehicles. This, he said, will ensure funds are available to construct good roads.
”How can a whole car pay 50 pesewas for a toll. at least if it goes up to about 2gh for the salon cars and and the bigger cars goes to about 3gh the big articulators so that you can raise some money to exhibit works on the roads. Figures show that the toll stores just 4 or 5% of monies that go to the road fund that’s why we need to increase it”, according to President of the Road Contractors Association, John Afful.
