The Ministry of Roads and Highways has initiated moves to automate toll booths across the country. This is to help do away with the manual system which results in leakages in revenue mobilisation. According to the Minister of Roads and Highways, Mr Joe Gidisu, the exercise was expected to commence on a pilot basis on the Accra Tema Motorway in the next two months, after which it would be extended to other areas. The minister, who was answering questions on the state of the country’s toll booths in Kumasi at an inter-agency durbar with staff of the Roads and Highways Ministry, admitted that there were leakages in toll collection, and that they were now being automated to reverse the trend. He said a careful stocktaking of vehicles that passed through the toll the did not reconcile with the tickets sold out, hence-there was the need to automate the booths. He stressed the need for the government to ensure effective road toll collection for road maintenance, since tolls should be paid by all. The durbar with the staff formed part of activities of the minister's working visit to the Ashanti Region, which also enabled him to inspect ongoing road projects. On toll rates; he said the ministry was submitting to cabinet a proposal to increase road tolls, as well as for other roads to be tolled, and that the proposal would also be put before Parliament for consideration as soon as it received the needed attention. Mr Gidisu acknowledged that the country needed more money to maintain existing roads and construct new ones. He called on staff of the ministry to inject institutional discipline in themselves and show commitment to their various jobs. He said the situation where staff of the ministry ran companies to compete for• jobs that they themselves were supposed to supervise would no longer be tolerated. "You must stop that since the radar is going to be on you. I am going to focus on this canker which is affecting the respect and recognition for us," he said. Mr James Appiah Frimpong, a staff of the Ghana Highway Authority (GHA) in Kumasi, suggested to the ministry to consider introducing on-the-spot fines for heavy duty vehicles which flout the axle load weight. He said the situation where defaulters were handed over to the police for them to be taken to court was cumbersome. "Some of the monies realised from the spot fines could be used to maintain many of the toll booths and axle weigh bridges which are in bad shape instead of the defaulters being sent to court after which the• monies go into the Consolidated Fund" He also proposed on-the-spot fine for road abusers like those who washed or repaired their vehicles on the road as well as the revenue for road repairs from outdoor road advertisements. Responding, Mr Joe Gidisu said there was a law which compelled motorists to pay for destruction of the road but the law enforcement agencies had been liberal in enforcing it. The Chief Director of the Ministry of Roads and Highways, Mr Twumasi Boakye, said a manual on outdoor advertisements on roadsides was being developed for advertisers. The minister also met with some contractors and told them that the government was going all out to institute mechanisms to do away with the delays, and called for restraint on the part of contractors. Source: Daily Graphic