Transport Unions to form taskforce on road safety
A police officer has suggested to commercial drivers unions in the Volta Region to form a joint taskforce to enforce road safety regulations among their members.
The Volta Regional Commander of the Motor Traffic and Transport Unit (MTTU), Assistant Superintendent of Police Augustine Lumor, made the suggestion at a meeting of leaders of the Ghana Private Road Transport Union (GPRTU) in Ho on Monday.
The meeting reviewed the activities and performance of the GPRTU in the region in 2011.
Mr Lumor said 61 percent of road crashes in the region in 2010 involved commercial drivers with motor cycles accounting for 21 percent and appealed to drivers’ unions in the region to aim at a drastic reduction in the number of accidents involving their members.
Mr Lumor urged the drivers to be safety conscious this Christmas period bearing in mind they and their passengers were breadwinners in their families.
He commended the GPRTU for initiating a programme to test drivers for alcohol beginning next year and told drivers’ unions to organize regular eye testing and other forms of medical screening for their members.
He urged commercial drivers to put premium on their role as movers of the economy without whom the wheel of economic activities in the country would come to a halt.
They should therefore act professionally in order to win the commendation of the citizenry.
Mr Moses Davor, Volta Regional Chairman of the GPRTU, urged drivers of the Union to ensure accident free period between now and the end of January next year ad appealed to road safety organizations to keep statistics of road accidents involving each of the commercial drivers’ unions in the country.
Mr Davor said this was necessary to disabuse public perception that GPRTU members were responsible for many road accidents in the country and added that the GPRTU would resume an awards scheme for its members in May 2012.
Mr Davor said commercial drivers deserved national honours similar those for teachers and farmers.
Source: GNA