The Accra-Tema Motorway was once the fastest link between Ghana’s capital and its main port city.
Today, for the thousands who ply the 19.5-kilometre stretch daily, it has become a corridor of frustration, dust, and growing danger.
The ongoing expansion, which began in 2024, is necessary.
Ghana needs wider lanes, better drainage, and modern interchanges on one of its busiest transport arteries.
However, as motorists and traders told the Daily Graphic this week, the way the project is being managed right now is putting lives, livelihoods, and time at risk.
What used to be a 20-minute trip from Accra to Ashaiman now takes more than an hour.
Safety concerns intensified last month after a fatal crash involving a fuel tanker and a tipper truck on the motorway.
One person died, and three others were hospitalised.
The Ghana National Fire Service and the Ghana Police Service confirmed the incident.
While no direct link to the construction was established, the timing should worry all of us.
Commuters say the problem is obvious, especially along the Manet to Tema stretch: limited warning signs, poor road markings, and little separation between live traffic and active construction.
When heavy trucks, private cars, pedestrians, and construction equipment share the same space without clear guidance, accidents are not a matter of “if” but “when.”
Maripoma Enterprise Limited, the contractor, says work is ongoing on overhead bridges, underbridges, drainage systems, retaining walls, and gutters.
The project is scheduled for completion between 2027 and 2028.
That is two more years of daily use.
We cannot wait until then to fix safety.
Here are five urgent steps.
The Ministry of Roads and Highways, in collaboration with the Ghana Police MTTD, must deploy more traffic personnel at peak congestion points.
Add reflective road markings, temporary rumble strips, concrete barriers between traffic and work zones, and solar-powered warning lights.
A construction zone should be impossible to miss, day or night.
There must be better communication with road users.
Variable message boards should warn drivers two kilometres before each work zone: “Reduce speed.
Construction ahead. Expect delays.” For instance, there should be daily updates on which lanes are closed. Information reduces frustration and risky driving.
Pedestrians and traders cross this road daily.
Temporary footbridges or clearly marked, signal-controlled crossing points with safety officers must be provided at Manet, Ashaiman, and other busy sections.
No one should risk their life to cross to work.
The police must ticket drivers who ignore flagmen and speed through work zones.
At the same time, the contractor must ensure its own safety officers are visible, trained, and equipped.
This project is about more than asphalt.
The Accra-Tema corridor carries goods to and from Tema Port. Delays here raise the cost of food, fuel, and imported goods for all of Ghana.
Dust and poor drainage also raise health costs.
That is why we must insist: development should not come at the cost of safety.
We acknowledge the work being done. New bridges and drainage will help when finished.
But infrastructure is judged not just by the final product, but by how we treat people while building it.
We remind the Ministry of Roads and Highways and the contractors that they should treat traffic management as part of the contract, not an add-on.
Release emergency funds if needed.
The contractor must listen to road users and adjust daily. More signs. More barriers. More engagement with driver unions and market associations.
Equally important is the fact that motorists must learn to slow down.
The Accra-Tema Motorway expansion can deliver the mobility the country needs only if we get through the construction period without more avoidable deaths and without losing public trust.
Let us build the road, and let us protect the people who use it. That is the standard Ghanaians deserve.
