Poor road conditions and unwanted demands from opportunists has forced transport providers along the East Road in Malaita province to halt services in the transportation business.
A local business man who wants his name withheld from publication told the Solomon Star office in Auki that he was now giving up on the transport business because of two reasons; the poor road conditions and hefty road demands from unauthorized road workers.
The local business man said the current poor road condition had attracted opportunists on the road again.
“These unauthorized road workers are making use of the poor road condition where they use spades and wheelbarrows to fill in the deteriorated areas and demanded hefty amounts of money for their unauthorized task”.
The local businessman said currently there are four road blocks along the East road where these unauthorized workers block passenger vehicles and demand money for their task.
“Their demand starts from $200 up to $500.”
The local business man said in a single trip up the East road, they would pay up to $1000 for the road workers which left the transport owners with no profit at the end of the day.
“We already paid for the road licence before we run on the road which is owned by the state, but then the state failed us by failing to maintain the East roads, it opens the door for these unauthorized workers which just makes things worse for us”.
The local business man said the areas that the the unauthorized workers fixed didn’t even last for a week.
The local business man called on the responsible authority to step in and address the situation as soon as possible before other transport providers’ fall victim, which will create more difficulties for the East road users.
Currently the East Road was one of the worst affected roads in Malaita province besides the South Road and North Road.
By BIRA’AU WILSON SAENI
In Auki
