COP C T Yohuno, Ing May Obiri Yeboah, Cheyuo Wifenaa Musah and DCOP Maxwell Atingani in a group photograph with stakeholders and MTTD officers at the Conference
The Inspector General of Police (IGP), Mr David Asante – Apeatu, has charged personnel of the Motor Traffic and Transport Department (MTTD) highway patrol teams and officers manning the various charge offices to change their negative attitude towards work.
He said the Police Service would win the confidence and support of the public as well as key strategic players in the country and beyond if personnel changed their negative attitude.
“ It is sad but worth stating without mincing words that a lot of us have stepped on the slippery moral slope and with initial justifications of a few unethical behaviours , we have shamelessly graduated into full-blown ethical viruses slipping very fast down the slope and infesting all your subordinates and peers,” the IGP charged.
Mr Asante-Apeatu made these remarks at the MTTD National Command Conference at the police headquarters in Accra.
The conference sought to identify challenges encountered by formations on regional basis and also have roundtable discussions in addressing them.
COP Christian Tetteh Yohuno, Director General in-charge of Operations who read a speech on behalf of the IGP, said the MTTD is mandated to ensure that road users adhere to traffic regulations.
He mentioned that the unacceptable recurrent deaths on the roads have challenged their collective conscience to do things anew.
“We want a change that will demonstrate an MTTD that respects the dignity of the citizenry, a change that will showcase the new MTTD with a much more sharpened professional leadership across the command chain,” said the IGP in his speech.
The Director General of MTTD, DCOP Maxwell Atingani, said in an address that among the biggest challenges facing the road sector are the unacceptable crashes and congestion in the major towns and cities.
He said a thorough examination of the problem had been attributed to the fact that the MTTD, the main enforcement arm of the Service, had been referred to as the weakest link in the road safety management chain.
“This is partly traceable to the fact that the composition, vis-a-vis the structure and challenges that the major traffic law enforcement unit is grappling with weaken the department,” DCOP Atingani noted.
The Firector in-charge of Driver Training Testing and Licensing of the DVLA, Cheyuo Wifenaa Musah, also hinted that the DVLA was coming out with a new driver licence which has more security features than the old one.
He said this is to deal with all fake driver licenses in the system and check the activities of ‘goro’ boys.
Ing May Obiri Yeboah, Executive Director of the National Road Safety Commission, expressed her displeasure about how the MTTD has not been using equipment donated to it by her unit.
By Linda Tenyah-Ayettey