By Benjamin Adamafio Commey
Accra, Oct. 14, GNA – Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP) Alexander Kwaku Obeng says Ghana must accelerate the deployment of digital technology to enforce road traffic regulations, improve compliance and reduce road crashes.
ACP Obeng, who is the Director of Education, Research and Training at the Motor Traffic and Transport Department (MTTD) of the Ghana Police Service, said manual enforcement had proved inadequate over the years, making it necessary to adopt automated systems to address dangerous driving behaviours, particularly speeding.
“Manual enforcement has been very weak all these years,” he said, adding that the traditional approach to gathering evidence and enforcing traffic laws was insufficient to address road safety challenges.
ACP Obeng made the call at a breakfast meeting with heads of stakeholder institutions organised by the National Road Safety Authority (NRSA) in Accra on Wednesday.
The meeting was aimed at strengthening collaboration among state agencies, assessing existing interventions and identifying gaps in road safety enforcement, infrastructure, public education and emergency response services and improving accountability by examining the responsibilities of state institutions and road users in preventing crashes.
The Government of Ghana, earlier this year, fixed October 1, for the rollout of TRAFFITECH-GH, an automated road traffic law enforcement, to help reduce road crashes and fatalities, and minimise driver indiscipline across public roads.
It was, however, rescheduled to November 1, to allow for more public education and awareness on how the system operates.
ACP Obeng said the Police had developed software to support the digital enforcement of selected traffic offences, with officers expected to use personal digital assistants to capture evidence of violations.
The initiative, he said, would enable offenders to receive evidence of their violations digitally and provide an opportunity to respond within 14 days, reducing delays and the need for physical encounters with enforcement officers.
ACP Obeng said the digital enforcement initiative had already begun targeting speeding, with about 24,000 caution notices issued to speeding drivers during the first 20 days of implementation between September 20 and October 10.
He said preliminary data for September 2026 showed a 9.48 per cent reduction in reported road crashes compared with the same period last year.
Vehicles involved in crashes declined by 12.19 per cent, persons injured by 15.02 per cent and road fatalities by 7.82 per cent, he said.
Motorcycle-related crashes also recorded a 7.41 per cent reduction, which he attributed to the impact of targeted enforcement.
ACP Obeng said speeding remained a major contributor to road crashes and called for sustained collaboration among the Police, road engineers, transport operators and local authorities to improve compliance.
He stressed that technology-driven enforcement, supported by appropriate road infrastructure and public cooperation, was essential to building safer roads across the country.
Mr Abraham Amaliba, Director-General of NRSA, said road crashes had become a public health and national security concern, requiring urgent and coordinated action by state institutions.
He said road safety interventions must be strengthened ahead of the Christmas and New Year festivities, when increased travel could lead to more crashes if preventive measures were not intensified.
“Road crashes have been proven a scourge, and it is important that we deal with them. It has now become a public health issue and a national security issue,” he said.
Mr Amaliba attributed road traffic crashes to systemic failures, including weak enforcement, poor infrastructure and irresponsible road-user behaviour.
He called on state agencies to assess their contributions to road safety and determine whether existing interventions were sufficient to reduce crashes and fatalities.
He said road authorities must also ensure that roads had adequate signs, markings and streetlights, stressing that responsibility for crashes should not be placed solely on drivers.
GNA
Edited by Benjamin Mensah
Reporter: Benjamin Adamafio Commey
Email address: [email protected]