The Honorable Member of Parliament (MP) for the Dormaa East Constituency, Paul Apraku Twum Barimah, has called on the government to Fast Track the automation of Tollbooths across the country to prevent revenue losses.
According to the Lawmaker, Ghana currently operates about 36 road toll collection booths nationwide and generates approximately one million Ghana cedis daily. Based on the estimates, he said the nation generates about 30 million Ghana Cedis a month from road toll alone.
However, he believes that if should the toll collection be automated or digitized, government could generate more revenue and even double the current rate since it would help eliminate all the leakages in the system that enable operators of the toll booths to divert some of the revenue into their pockets.
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“Government must ensure the automation of all road toll booths and all revenue mobilisation streams to help achieve the set revenue targets. ensuring efficiency in toll collection through digitisation and limiting human interface or discretion is the surest way to preventing corruption. When road tolls are digitized and the leakages are sealed, government would be earning adequate revenue and there would be no need to increase the tall as has been proposed by some economic analyst” he stated.
Information from Ghana’s Ministry of Roads reveals that Ghana is losing a minimum of 40 per cent revenue, maximum 80 per cent revenue from our toll booths.
Reports indicate that only 4 out of the 36 toll booths have so far been automated.
The four are the Ngleshie Amanfrom, Accra Plaza, Tema Plaza and the Amasaman booths.
By Adu Koranteng