Govt must rather jealously protect jobs and globally acceptable practices of internal revenue generation

SDDDF-Africa finds it troubling the government's move to scrap the Tolling system of revenue generation for the state, a regrettable decision that carries in its wake massive loss of revenue now and in the foreseeable future.

The decision which seemed lightly taken with no clear alternatives, also renders unemployed, about 370 Toll Booth Attendants of which about 30 percent are Persons With Disabilities (PWDs).

Also frustrating is the fact that no prior notice had been given about this abrupt and irresponsible loss of legitimate contracts of staff which is against Ghana's labour laws. The government's assertion that the affected employees were going to be reassigned with immediate effect is a hoax as these 370 staffs are still at home.

SDDDF-Africa is struggling to come to terms with how the Minister for Roads and Highways could sidestep Parliament and reverse a policy that is backed by an Act of Parliament. It is also worthy of note that, the budget presentation by the Finance Minister, Ken Ofori Attah was a mere proposal and needed to be debated for Parliamentary approval or rejection before any implementation.

In this economy, that jobs are difficult to come by, the least expected of any well-intentioned government is to protect the maximum interest of the suffering people.

Ours does appear to be a consistent effort on the part of the central government to work against the interest of our people; destroying their jobs; denying them their livelihoods.

Suffice to say, the current decision and the consequences faced by the people is not markedly different from what private school owners, teachers, and all other workers in that sector suffered as a result of the government's decision to exclude them from the free SHS, resulting in about 10, 000 individuals losing their jobs.

The situation is also not different from what a lot of Ghanaian workers and some depositors massively suffered when traditional banks, Savings & Loans companies, Microfinance Institutions, etc suffered a collapse in 2018.

In SDDDF-Africa's view on the Toll Booths matter, reasons such as heavy traffic at the Toll Booths for which some are in support of the scrapping is untenable, suggesting that attention should rather be directed at widening and increasing the number of Toll Booths at such spots to make traffic flow easy.

SDDDF-AFRICA is of the view that the Minister acted unprofessionally and has willfully caused financial loss to the state and must be charged accordingly.

Central Government through the Local Government Ministry, Ministry of Roads & Highways must also be innovative and create land spaces along highways to serve as a rest stop or hawking spots for travellers in order to take away hawking activities around the Toll Booths on the highways as that is life-threatening.

Also, to have tertiary institutions churn out 100,000 graduates each year, on the back of which Ghana's Youth unemployment has currently hit 12%, it, therefore, explains why the 2020 Afrobarometer report released by the Ghana Centre for Democratic Development (CDD), has stated that unemployment is the biggest challenge for Ghanaian youths, requiring very urgent steps to be taken to address the matter in order to avoid a national catastrophe.

God bless our Homeland Ghana.

Make our nation great and strong.