General News of Wednesday, 19 May 2021

Source: www.ghanaweb.com

Increasing transport fares will not help – Drivers lament

A driver speaking to GhanaWeb play videoA driver speaking to GhanaWeb

• Drivers have stated that the new transports will burden passengers

• They have called on the government to reconsider their decision and rather reduce the fuel prices

• Although the new price fares will be beneficial it will also trigger confusion

Some drivers at the 37 lorry station have explained that, plans to increase transport fares is likely to have a negative impact on them due to the recent increment in fuel prices.

According to them, the government needs to reconsider its decision and engage stakeholders on the appropriate methods to employ to rather decrease the fuel prices at the fuel pumps.

Speaking to GhanaWeb’s Amos Ekow Coffie, they noted that, the current price of the fuel is high and it is crippling their operations, hence passengers are not even willing to pay the fare.

He added that as a result, increasing it will add more burden to their woes.

“The increment will help us because we will make some money but also it will bring lots of confusion among, we the drivers and the passengers so the government should rather consider reducing the fuel prices,” they noted.

The Vice-Chairman of the 37 Ghana Private Road Transport Union, (G.P.R.T.U) Yaw Amoako, stated that the fares are already expensive so increasing it again is not the best decision.

“We load from here to Tema and its environs and since I started working here the salary of most workers who ply our routes hasn’t changed, it is still the same so increasing fares will burden the passengers, even though the fuel price is expensive we are managing and trying our best so what the government needs to do is to reduce the fuel prices not to increase fares,” he said.

Watch the full interview below