The Institute for Governance Reform (IGR), an independent public policy think tank working strengthening governance and development through evidence-based research and citizen engagement has revealed in its just released report on the Toll Gate that the Government of Sierra Leone has lost $172 M.
The report stated that, the toll road is a lucrative enterprise Sierra Leone can use as a sustainable mechanism for financing major trunk roads in the country.
On average, the report stattes that USD21m is raised in toll fares every year, which amounts to an estimated USD172m that should have been collected over the last nine years. However, only USD1m has been paid to the GoSL’s National Revenue Authority over the same time period.
The total amount paid to the contract is undisclosed, and it remains difficult for the GoSL to learn from the toll road project on how to finance the construction and maintenance of the national road network. While the contractor has never made the toll data public, weak oversight from GoSL’s Parliament, as well as the Audit Service, has not helped.
The Sierra Leone Roads Authority (SLRA) has acknowledged that it has not conducted any vehicle counts since the toll road was constructed. IGR notes that successive Ministers of Works have adopted the same posture in dealing with CRSG – that is, hide all information on toll operations from the public and establish/increase toll fees without any convincing explanation. The report indicated that at a discounted payback period of approximately 10.8 years, the toll road recovers its full investment well before the end of the 27-year BOOT concession. This leaves an estimated 16 years during which revenues accrue entirely to the private operator, despite the absence of unrecovered capital risk. 5 BOOT is a standard inance model used by many foreign contractors that stands for build, own, operate, and transfer. From a public finance and value-for-money perspective, this constitutes a material transfer of surplus revenue from the state to the concessionaire, because Sierra Leone commuters are painstakingly paying for the toll contract, GoSL and the service provider owe it to the public to make toll revenue data and transactions transparent. If secrecy around the toll road is addressed, GoSL could use the correct information to re-negotiate the contract, the report added.