Don't collect donations for workers' welfare fund on roads: Road safety leaders

Leaders of the Road Safety Foundation and the Bangladesh Road Safety Network have called on road transport worker organisations to collect donations for the workers' welfare fund in offices, not on roads.

"Rampant extortions are taking place openly under various names in the road transport sector across the country with slips and sticks in hand," said Road Safety Foundation Chairman Professor Dr AI Mahbub Uddin Ahmed, Executive Director Saidur Rahman, and Bangladesh Road Safety Network Coordinator Harun ar-Rashid in a joint statement.

"The transport leaders deny any involvement in these extortions. They claim to collect only Tk30 per vehicle daily for the workers' welfare fund. This raises the question of who is behind the widespread extortion across the country and who stands to gain from it," reads the statements.

The statement noted that the burden of blame and stigma for these extortions typically falls on transport worker leaders.  It questioned whether a group of perpetrators is engaging in regular extortion and shifting the blame onto the transport leaders.

Extortion is the main obstacle to establishing discipline in road transport, the road safety leaders opined.

"If the transport workers' organisations want to collect donations for the workers' welfare fund, they could just avoid collecting them disorderly from the roads and instead opt for office-based collection," the leaders recommended.

This can exempt them [transport leaders] from the stigma of extortion charges while helping establish discipline on the roads, they said. 

Moreover, by adopting this method, those who continue to extort on the roads can be identified, making it easier to take action against them.