Now we are to introduce tolls on the main roads by the 20th April This is bizarre.
First no facilities exist at the toll sites – what are the authorities
going to do? Set up a table next to the road with a policeman to stop
the traffic while someone collects the toll and writes out a receipt!
You can imagine the chaos, On Monday between Harare and Bulawayo there
were 14 Police road blocks – what they were doing is anyone’s guess,
the bus drivers must be furious with this constant interference. Now
toll stops!
Secondly they are all miles out of town – they have to be, so three
times a day a bus is going to have to travel to and from the sites to
drop off the staff. Night and day, 365 days a year. Once there there is
no shelter, no security for the money collected and no power for
lighting. Are they going to run generators at all sites?
Then there is the fact that we have no idea what the volume of traffic
is likely to be – or what kinds of vehicles – under these conditions we
can expect all officials on the tolls to become wealthy overnight and
very little revenue to go to the State. There is absolutely no way you
can control cash at these points without an elaborate system similar to
that in South Africa where the system is only justified when you have
hundreds of vehicles an hour passing through.
Last time the authorities attempted this there were a number of serious
accidents – in one case the collection office built in the middle of
the road was wiped out by a truck at night. This happened three times
and then the builders abandoned the site and removed the construction
materials.
A simple levy on fuel is much better – it can be collected at source,
we have full control and it costs next to nothing to collect. Please,
sanity must prevail.
Eddie Cross
Post published in: News