We will soon reassign toll collectors – Road and Highways ministry assures
The Roads and Highways Ministry has revealed its plans of reassigning all the toll collectors who were rendered jobless after toll booths across the country were closed.
However, Deputy Public Relations Officer of the Ministry, Isaac Adjei Kwakye said no definite date can be given for when the reassignment will be done, but the ministry is working to ensure it happens soon.
“We will reassign them through the company [that employed them]. As and when the processes are completed, they will be reassigned. It is not as if we have abandoned them. As soon as possible, they will be reassigned. This reassignment is a process and not an event. When it is done, we will get them reassigned through the company, and they will be called,” he said.
On Thursday, May 12, 2022, some former toll booth attendants in Accra massed up at the Ministry of Roads and Highways to demand the payment of their salaries which have been in arrears as well as reassignment.
The government after the closure of tollbooths assured that it would reassign the attendants and continue paying them their salaries during the waiting period following the closure of toll booths, but the government is yet to honour its promise.
But Isaac Adjei Kwakye indicated that the government is still working on their reassignment but denied claims that the government owes the former toll collectors.
He explained that the government only engages the private company contracted to undertake the toll collection.
Mr Kwakye said the government is aware that the former collectors were paid for the months of November and December 2021 and are thus owed four months’ salary, but that is between them and their employers, the private company.
“It is not true that they’ve not been paid for seven months. In fact, after the presentation of the 2022 budget in Parliament in November 2021, they have been paid their November and December salaries. The outstanding ones have to do with January, February, March and April 2022,” he said.
“As we speak today, we have been honouring our obligations as far as the company is concerned. The non-payment of salaries is not on our part but let’s be honest, since December last year they have not worked,” he added.
