Dr Muhammed Idris Bhuiyan :
In Bangladesh we have 3,544 km national highways, 4,278 km regional highways and 13,659 km district roads. The deterioration of our roads and the consequence of loss of asset value have mainly been caused by inadequate funding and poor management. Road maintenance and other expenditures have been financed from general tax revenues in competition with several other and obviously much more pressing demands on the revenue. There has been no clear price for roads except considering its social service.
In recent years, there has been a resurgence of interest in Road Funds, a constituted separate fund, outside the central government’s budgetary framework, charged with responsibility for financing road maintenance services all over the world. That such road fund should be subjected to as an interim step towards either full commercialisation of road maintenance or to return to good governance within the public sector, and that in deciding whether to create (or retain) fund decision makers should estimate its effects on resource allocation and operational efficiency.
The Roads management experts outline its initiatives, consistent with the requirement of key principles of good governance. 1. Involving road users in the management of roads. 2. Securing enough money for road maintenance year after year. 3. Ensuring that all parties know what they are responsible for.4.Establishing a system for managing roads programmes with clear accountability. In institutional terms, the road funds provide a predictable source of finance for the maintenance under some models, the construction of roads. The advantages of setting of Road Funds is that user charges provide a link between the level and quality of service and price to be paid. Road maintenance has a low priority because few perceive the benefits out of it and the cost of inadequate maintenance is not always immediately obvious.
Roads have been managed by inadequate funding and complicated by very poor institutional framework. Poor conditions of service, lack of clearly defined responsibilities, ineffective and week management structure and lack of managerial accountability have been contributed to poor use of the meager funds available. Consequently, the Road Agencies suffer from lack of suitable qualified and experienced staff to plan, programme, monitor and regulate work undertaken by own forces as well as by private contractors. It has thus long been clear that the problem of road maintenance is not one of engineering but of policies and management.
Situation demands major policy changes in; (i) collection and disbursement of road maintenance funds. (ii) improving the operational efficiency of road maintenance, (iii) development of organisation and management of roads, (iv) development of staff retention, motivation and utilisation.
A Road User Tariff may be introduced to provide adequate and dedicated funds for road maintenance, with the proceeds to be deposited in an Autonomous Fund. A Board of management may be established for administration of the Road Fund with members from Government Ministries, the Chamber of Commerce, and from private sector road organisations. The activities of the Fund should be audited by independent auditors. The account of the fund should be maintained in Commercial Banks, and these accounts should be opened through a tender to ensure best terms and conditions are obtained and the money protected.
Of late the Road Fund Act has been passed by the Parliament in 2013 (but not yet enforced). The main feature of the Act is that a Board will be constituted consisting 12 members executive Committee. (a) the Secretary of the Road Division will be the Chairman (b) the Secretary of the Bridge Division, (c) a Joint Secretary nominated by the Finance Division (d) a Joint Secretary nominated by the Road Division (e) Chief of the Physical Infrastructure Division (f) Chairman of the BRTA (g) Chairman of the BRTC (h) Executive Director of the Dhaka Transport Authority. (i) Chief engineer of the RHD (j) A Professor from Dept Civil Engineering nominated by Bangladesh University of Engineering Technology, (k) A representative of the Road Transport owner association nominated by BRTA. (They will be nominated and may be removed by the government at any time without assigning any reason), (l) the Chief Executive Officer will be secretary of the Board.
The embarrassing feature is that 10 members from Public Sector and 2 from Private or road user sector. The public sector members have the right to dominate whereas the private sector members have the right to participate only. The road user dominated Board can represent a major change of policy in the institutional structure for the road sector. The government is perhaps planning to hand over few roads to the private sector as well as to create a partnership between the private and public sector for the management of the road. But the formation of the Road Fund Board under the newly promulgated law on traditional bureaucratic mode will ignore the road user view and oppose PPP concept.
We may have experience from Road Board of Zambia where there are 7 members from private sector and 4 members from public sector. The private sector members who are in the majority are nominees of road user non-governmental organisations, whilst 4 members of the public sector represent relevant ministries. The private sector members have the right to vote and the public sector members have the right to participate without right to vote. In Tanzania, the Board has 9 members, of whom four from the public sector and 5 from the users groups (including the Chairperson who is appointed by the President from amongst persons outside the civil service).
RHD is entrusted with the responsibility of management, development and control of the National Road and Highways. But it has no statutory objectives. It has no separate legal entity. It is Department of the Government under Ministry of Communication. In the Road Fund Board Chief Engineer of the RHD is in the ninth position. Strengthening RHD means to move it towards an Autonomous Roads & Highway authority to take over responsibility of the present RHD for properly managing the nation’s road network. The authority shall be administered by a Board to be appointed by the Prime Minister. One third of the members should represent the Government authorities, while the remaining shall comprise representatives of private sector stakeholders. The Board should report to the Government designated to be responsible for the Authority. Sound Business Practices should be adopted by the authority, including competitive tendering for required works and services, commercial accounting systems, and auditing by qualified external auditors. The proposed autonomous authority should be sufficiently competitive and performance related to attract, motivate and retain RHD’s staff with the necessary qualifications and competence, and facilitate dismissal of non- performing staff.
Private Sector Involvement in maintenance should be increased by institution with appropriate business environment for use of consultants and contractors. For involving the private sector in efforts to attain better use of government plant, the use of labour-based methods should be facilitated to the extent feasible by proactive Government policies and regulations.
(The author is an advocate, Supreme Court and columnist, now providing consultancy on laws of road sector)
