The Customs Division of the Ghana Revenue Authority (GRA) has cautioned truck drivers against tampering with transit goods while trying to repair broken-down vehicles.
The Head of the Transit Unit of the GRA, Assistant Commissioner, Peter Antobre Ofori, who said this at the Transit Shipper Committee meeting in Accra, noted that tampering with goods in transit is illegal and attracts sanctions.
“Failure to report incidents that occur in transit to the Customs and solving them by tampering with the goods or otherwise is tantamount to infractions which attract penalties,” he stated.
According to him, the GRA has noted the worrying phenomenon of transit cargo weight misreporting on Ghana’s corridors and is concerned about the potential revenue loss to the state.
He noted that perpetrators would face sanctions such as seizure and detention of the goods, blocking Agents from further transiting through the country’s corridors and prosecution.
According to him, adhering to the procedures for managing unexpected events would go a long way to improve the declining rate of transit trade on Ghana’s corridor, which has been attributed to the enforcement of rules governing trade.
The Head of the Freight and Logistics Department of GSA and Chairman of the Transit Shipper Committee, Mr Fred Asiedu-Dartey, called for an all-hands-on-deck approach to dealing with the decline in transit trade on the corridor.
The representative from Burkina Faso’s Shippers Council in Ghana, Ms Denise Bado Bouba, backed the call by Mr Asiedu-Dartey and asked for pragmatic steps to address the challenge.
Richard Aniagyei, ISD