Freko to establish car maintenance service station…at Kejetia Lorry Terminal to check road accidents

IN ITS resolve to help bring road accidents to the barest minimum, Freko FD Enterprise Limited, managers of the Kejetia Bus Terminal in Kumasi, has announced a number of measures to arrest the alarming situation.

The company intends to establish a Maintenance Service Station at the terminal as soon as the Kumasi Metropolitan Assembly (KMA), the facility owner, endorses the proposal.

The proposed Maintenance Service Station is to be equipped to provide services in brake testing, shock absorbers, emission testing, wheel backing and tyre changing, among others.

The Managing Director, Mrs. Freda Darko-Manu, hoped that the initiative would encourage other lorry terminals to emulate the concept, and help to drastically reduce accidents on the roads.

She also disclosed that the company would soon introduce electronic cards (Paxton Access cards) to drivers operating at the terminal, to ensure that the particulars of drivers and the movement of their vehicles to and from their destinations are monitored in a bid to provide a solution to the rampant accidents on the roads.

Mrs. Freda Darko-Manu told The Ashanti File that the exercise would start on a pilot basis, and that the company was negotiating with the various transport unions to create the awareness for its acceptance, in order to complement the efforts of the government and the police at reducing accidents on the roads.

She disclosed that the new Metropolitan Chief Executive (MCE) of the KMA would be furnished with the details for approval as soon as he assumes office, to make the concept operational.

Also on the company's drawing board is the creation of an Evacuation Park at the terminal, to enable traders and commuters to load and off load goods to and from the terminal.

Mrs. Darko-Manu said her company was poised to adopt modern management technology in running the facility, and called on the new administration, under President Atta Mills, to support the company technically to meet its objectives, while complementing efforts of the government in reducing accidents on the roads, which has become a matter of great concern to all stakeholders.

Meanwhile, the Freko MD has welcomed government's decision to introduce log books at the lorry stations across the country, to check movement of drivers on the roads, and pledged her company's preparedness to offer supervision as managers of the Kejetia Terminal, which deals with over 80 per cent of drivers and commercial vehicles which ply between Kumasi and other destinations.