A truck going over the weighing scale
Overloading cargo truck drivers entering the Bolgatanga Municipality of the Upper East Region with goods have devised new tricks to outwit the officials of the Bolgatanga Axle Load Weighing Station and escape with their excess load.
As the cargo drivers overload their trucks, they exert extra weight on the road, which road experts say contributes to the creation of the many potholes on the country's roads.
Over the years, some selfish drivers of overloaded trucks have contributed to the shortening of the lifespan of many roads and have succeeded in getting away with the extra money they make from one trip.
For close to one year, the Axle Load Weighing Station had to be closed down to undergo renovation and repairs, thereby giving overloading vehicles a field day. In February 2014 the Station started operating once again and has become a thorn in the flesh of cargo truck drivers and their partners-in- crime.
The trick the drivers use, according to our source, is that they park close to the Bolgatanga township, allow their partners-in-crime to use other smaller trucks to offload the excess load to town, before the bigger cargo truck goes through the Axle Weighing Station to be weighed.
Before the resumption of work at the Station in February 2014, there was a Mobile Weighing Unit and so the long queues of overloaded cargo trucks were absent. There are cargo drivers who park their trucks along the road, and expect power outage so that they can go about their illegal business.
The officer in-charge of the Bolgatanga Axle Load Weighing Station, Alhaji Sly Gibril in an interview with the DAILY GUIDE, said there are a lot of selfish drivers and cargo truck owners who always want to get their trucks overload to make extra money at the expense of the nation.
According to him, his office is poised to ensure that drivers who perpetrate the act are punished, to compel them to stop the practice and to serve as deterrent to others.
He said the Axle Load Weighing Station had received a lot of
cooperation from the Ghana Police Service, but wanted the police to intensify their efforts to prevent drivers from parking on the side of the road saying, the continuous parking of over loaded trucks at the edge of the road could cause some more damage to the road.
From: Ebo Bruce-Quansah, Bolgatanga
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