Transport Crisis: Operators debunk claims of creating artificial shortage

An executive secretary of a private transport union Ibrahim Musa has dismissed claims that transport operators deliberately created the current shortage of commercial vehicles being experienced in certain parts of the country.

He has attributed the situation instead to ageing fleets and inadequate government support.

Musa made this assertion on Friday, January 16, 2026, during an engagement with Vice President Professor Jane Naana Opoku-Agyemang at the Ministry of Transport.

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He explained that the lack of consistent resourcing for private transport operators has left many vehicles broken down, worsening the transport challenges being experienced across the country.

“… all the cars are now old… most of them will work one day; tomorrow they will not work. They are all at the shops and then somebody in his publication will say we have created an artificial shortage. Who would go and park his car to create that shortage and go and sleep without food?” he queried.

Musa further accused the government of sidelining private operators in budgetary allocations, while prioritising state-owned transport companies.

“Whenever there is a budgetary allocation and then they are going to share, they allocate how much they will give to Metro Mass, how much they give to STC and forget us,” he stated.

He also raised concerns about the quality of buses imported from Egypt for operators, describing them as compromised and inferior to what was originally inspected.

“The buses they had brought to us from Egypt were highly compromised in terms of quality. What we went there as a delegation and inspected and what was brought was not what was given to us.

“The engines, which were six-cylinder engines, which were inspected came down as four-cylinder engines. The axle width and the air-conditioning motors were all compromised,” he revealed.

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Musa also warned that unless urgent steps are taken to adequately resource private transport operators, the ongoing transport difficulties will persist.

“If efforts are not made to resource us, the problem may not go,” he cautioned.

MAG/AE

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