Road Toll Directive: Ministry Defends Road Minister

The Ministry of Roads and Highways has defended the statement of the Roads and Highways Minister, Kwasi Amoako Atta on the cessation of roads and bridge tolls nationwide.

The ministry is saying that “they are aware that the statement on the road and bridge tolls by the Minister of Finance as captured under Paragraph 306 of the 2022 Budget was to the effect that the cessation will be triggered immediately after parliament approves the budget”.

In a press release, the ministry stated that, however, “the Minister of Finance’s statement either got misunderstood or misinterpreted by some motorist, as many of them deemed the statement as having an immediate effect and therefore decided not to pay the road and bridge toll”.

According to the ministry, the insistence of toll workers to have the tolls paid resulted in a “serious confusion” leading to damage of lives and property. And this led to the issuing of the directive from the Road Minister, Kwasi Amoako Atta, to halt the collection of tolls immediately to “avert further unfortunate incident”.

In the release, the ministry explained that “the action was taken to suspend the operationalization of the collection of the tolls and not to suspend the law”.

However, the Parliament of Ghana led by the Speaker, Alban Bagbin has directed the Minister of Roads and Highways, Amoako Atta to withdraw his directive for the immediate cessation of the collection of tolls on public roads, describing the Minister’s directive as “disrespect to the house”.

Source: Opemsuo.com\ Emmanuel Owusu Anti.