THE news albeit bitter for, especially passengers and commuters, is that road transport fares have been increased by 15 per cent. This was announced in a release issued last Monday and jointly signed by representatives of the Ghana Private Roads Transport Union (GPRTU) and the Ghana Roads Transport Coordinating Council (GRTCC).
HOWEVER, there is a bit of relief to passengers. And that is the increment in the transport fares will take effect, tomorrow, April 6, 2017. This means that passengers have from the day of the announcement (Monday, April 03-Thursady, April 06, 2017) a three-day sort of respite to continue paying the old transport fares.
ALSO, in the said release GPRTU and GRTCC called on the transport unions to comply with the new fares and “post the fare list at their loading terminals so as to avoid any confrontation with the travelling public.” The two bodies further asked Ghanaians to cooperate with the implementation of the new fares. The fares, we understand, cover intra-city, inter city and taxi services.
THIS is the first upward review of transport fares in 2017. Increment in transport fares has often come with its own associated problems. These problems have ranged from verbal exchanges to sometimes fisticuffs between conductors of tro-tro (who are popularly referred to as mates) and passengers.
SADLY, some of these nasty scenes happen right in the middle of the roads, often causing unnecessary traffic. And what normally brings about these scenes is the amount of money added onto to old fares, in the wake of new fares.
WHILE passengers believe mates take advantage of such increments to overly charge them, mates on the other hand stand by whatever calculation they use to arrive at their new fares. And this has often been a source of agitation between the two.
TODAY believes that one way we can solve this problem is for GPRTU and GRTCC to work the new fares out and hand them over to their branch unions who will in turn pass it on to their members with the instruction that the fare lists should be visibly pasted in their cars to allow passengers have access to it. Such notice should have a GPRTU and GRTCC stamps embossed on them to ensure that it is authentic.
HAVING made the above suggestion we seize this opportunity to impress upon commercial drivers and their mates to make sure they do not exploit passengers, following the announced increment in transport fares. However, when passengers feel they are being cheated by mates we advise that they report such drivers and mates to the various GPRTU branches in their localities for the matter to be dealt with.
THIS, Today believes, will prevent the unnecessary confrontations associated with new transport fares that ensue between, especially mates and passengers.
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