Ranking Member of Parliament’s Roads and Transport Committee, Governs Kwame Agbodza
Road tolls abolished
Abolishment of road tolls unsustainable
Speaker directs Minister to bring back road tolls
Ranking Member of Parliament’s Roads and Transport Committee, Kwame Governs Agbodza, wants road tolls to be re-introduced.
This comes after the Roads Minister, Kwasi Amoako-Attah announced that security personnel will continue to be deployed to the empty tollbooths.
The security personnel, he said, will among other things, prevent speeding trucks from destroying the structures.
Mr. Agbodza who was speaking to CitiNews said the abolishment of the road tolls is a move that is financially unsustainable because government is having a tough time raising revenue.
“He is rather trying to create more jest by saying he will maintain security at post. This is evident of how out of touch the government is becoming. He must be called to order. The tollbooths should only be empty. Motorists in the country have not complained about the payment of road tolls. All that the public complain about is that, they can’t see the effect of the road tolls on the nature of the road,” Kwame Governs Agbodza said.
“What the government should have done was to prove that they are utilizing the resources appropriately, not to say that they are only going to collect the road tolls,” he added.
Mr. Agbodza called on the roads minister to order toll collectors back to post “so that we can continue to generate revenue from there, instead of introducing other taxes such as E-Levy.”
The Ministry of Roads and Highways directed that the collection of road tolls should be stopped on all public roads and bridges across the country from Thursday, November 18, 2021 after the finance minister announced it in the 2022 budget.
This came with a lot of contention after which the Speaker of Parliament, Alban Bagbin, directed the roads minister to rescind the decision, saying it was illegal and must be immediately withdrawn.
The Speaker argued that despite the fact that it was announce in the 2022 budget, it remains a proposal until Parliament approves it.
This directive was not heeded to by the minister as the tollbooths have remained closed ever since.