Passengers continue to express their frustration and distress with The Gambia Ports Authority over its alleged poor service delivery in recent times.
Travelers have complained of the snail pace of the ferries leaving hundreds of passengers waiting for hours to cross to their destinations.
The GPA last bought a new ferry in 2017 and since then, they have not bought a new one despite relentless criticism about their poor service delivery.
The current state of ferries imposes a threat on passengers as hundreds of customers were left stranded last year alone on numerous occasions without numbers yet, the authorities have not done much to tackle the situation.
Earlier on Sunday, the Kanilai ferry got stranded at the coast which left passengers with no option but to forcefully jump out of the ferry as it struggled to dock.
Despite increasing the ferry’s fees and a policy decision of introducing an exorbitant fee in the name of ‘VIP’ for motorists, service delivery remains the same, going from bad to worse.
“We bought a priority ticket at 1 pm yet, we could only cross at 8 pm. This is a scam and unbecoming of a national institution. The ferry left Banjul for Barra around 2 pm yet, it only returned after three hours. This is frustrating to the passengers, especially after spending such a significant amount to get to your destination timely” an eyewitness to this medium.
Marr Nyang an activist recently turned to his social media handle to lash at GPA for alleged corruption in their queuing system.
“If you want to witness the highest level of corruption, inequality and incompetence, Gambia Ferry Services queue controllers are a perfect case study of grand corruption and greed. They introduced an express service called “VIP”, where you pay a higher price and experience the highest level of inequality and corruption by queue controllers.
Gambia Ports Authority for over a decade this inequality and corruption has been happening under your watch and it is getting worse by the day. Your attempt to introduce the so-called VIP service is even putting more wood in the burning fire. Gosh!” Nyang wrote in his stunning reaction.
Babou Loum reacted: “Marr Nyang, there is no motivation to do the right thing. I am sure you know about the concept that when corruption is widespread there are economic benefits of being corrupt. That is the stage we are in, if corruption was a cancer we are at the end stage”.
Despite all these criticisms against GPA, the institution is yet to break the silence on the situation and efforts to get them have all proven futile.