GRC MUST COME AGAIN

The Daily Graphic yesterday reported that the Ghana Railway Company (GRC) has reminded the general public that its rail tracks are restricted areas and relatives of persons involved in accidents on the line will be prosecuted. The GRC quoted from the Railway code of 1950, which describes the rail line as a restricted area. It also absolves the GRC from any liability.

However, recalcitrant people who have put up structures close to the rail lines and also engage in hawking along the tracks have infringed upon these restrictions. These illegal acts have unfortunately led to most of the train accidents that have happened in recent times.

Much as The Chronicle would not condone with the squatters who have made the areas along the rail lines their homes and market places, we believe the Ghana Railway Company must also be blamed for the mess they find themselves in at the moment.

It is common knowledge that it is GRC employees who sell out these spaces along the rail tracks to the squatters and also collect tolls from those who hawk along the lines. As a result of these actions and inactions of the GRC employees, it has created the hundreds of wooden, cement and metal structures that dot the entire length of the rail lines.

The residents of these structures are the same people who traverse the rail lines to access their needs, family and friends, and therefore become vulnerable to the train accidents. It will, therefore, be very unreasonable on the part of the GRC to enforce the Railway code of 1950, to check illegality which is their own creation.

We also blame the bad urban planning of our major Towns and Cities. The haphazard development of Residential areas did not take the existing railways into consideration, such that the rail lines cut across Towns and Cities. As a result people of the same Town have to criss-cross rail lines in pursuit of their normal activities.

The Chronicle would rather agree with the statement of Mr. Michael Adjei Anyetei, an Engineer with the GRC, that the Company is considering the fencing of rail lines. This will seem a plausible immediate solution rather than trying to enforce a law that was enacted in 1950, when rail lines could only be found at the remotest parts of our Towns and Cities.

Today, the population of Ghana has increased and more residential areas have developed to cover the remote parts of our Towns and Cities. As a result, the rail lines have moved into the Town centres. It will, therefore, be difficult to rationalise the GRC's decision to enforce the Railway code of 1950 today. The GRC should therefore think about fencing the rail lines now, and look forward to a long-term solution of massive construction of underground tunnels and flyovers.

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