By Assan Bah
Commuters using the Farato Bojang-Kunda have lamented the bad feeder road conditions in their area while calling on the government to respond to their call.
They made the call on Saturday, July 30, 2022.
Sulayman Bayo, who was found waiting for a vehicle at the Farato-Bojang Kunda garage, said it is always hard to travel to Bafuloto during the rainy season which is caused by the bad road.
“During the rainy season, the road will always be in a bad condition and make it very difficult for us to travel from the main highway to Bojang Kunda and Bafuloto. Drivers will always tell us that the road is very bad and I am not going there or using my vehicle on that bad road,” he said.
He said nowadays a taxi only uses the route on a town trip basis because of the bad condition of the road.
“They even increase the towntrip from 100 to 150 and sometimes 200,” he said.
“When it rains, you even find it difficult to walk by foot to Bojang-Kunda because of the inundated water on the road.”
He called on the government, Area Council and NGOs to help them with good feeder roads.
“We always find it very difficult to come here as the drivers will not risk transporting us because the road damages their vehicles,” he called.
Fatou Ceesay, a vendor who sells vegetables at the Brikama market, said she does not finish her sales sometimes because when it rains, there will be no vehicle which will take her to the main highway and as a result she will be late.
“I will sometimes reach the market around 9am and will find many have already done their shopping and I will only sell a little of my products and take the rest home which will spoil since I don’t have a facility to store,” she said.
She called on the government to help them with good feeder roads to minimise the economic losses they encounter.
Sutay Saidykhan, a van driver at the Bojang Kunda – Bafuloto, said they have written several times to various government offices but there is still no response. He said the road is damaging their vehicles and a good number of taxis that were using the route have been packed or plying other routes.
“It is us with these old vans (three vans) who are here managing and we even have to increase the fares from D10 to 15 dalasi.
We are calling on the government to help us with a good road, if not it will not be easy for us (both the drivers and the commuters) all those going to Bojang-Kunda, Bafuloto, and Magkumbaya all use this route,” he said.
According to the drivers, each vehicle plying the route as of last year was asked to pay the sum of D3000,00 as registration fees but it has also increase to D4000,00 per vehicle. “We are therefore urging the local authorities and Government officials to come to our aid and fix the road for the befit of all and sundry.”
It was brought to the attention of this Newspaper by an ex-member of Bojang Kunda Village Development Committee (VDC) in Farato that a contract was awarded to GAMWORKS approximately amounting to half a million dalasi but looking at the condition one would wonder what happened to the project because the said road is only constructed with red ‘Gravels.’
Foroyaa will engage the Ward Councillor, Alkalo of Bojang Kunda, the VDC and Area Council respectively to find out the essence of collecting proceeds from Vehicle Owners as registration fees and also what Council is trying to do to ensure that the road condition is addressed.
