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Dr Kwasi Apea-Kubi, the Deputy Minister of the Interior, on Wednesday said inadequacies in the national identification system had tended to make efforts in law enforcement, especially of road traffic regulations, difficult. "Without accessible data on persons and vehicles, the average motor traffic officer, must physically restrain and apprehend offending road users before they can be processed for prosecution. This usually involves personal confrontation with related militant and aggressive approaches which should not be so," he said. He explained that even the authentic drivers' licence and other forms of identification did not carry their real value since the actual identity of the holder cannot be verified with any national database. Dr Apea-Kubi said this at an International Road Safety Conference organized jointly by the National Road Safety Commission (NRSC) and the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority (DVLA) to climax their 10th anniversary. The conference, which attracted international participation from neighbouring West African countries and some members of the diplomatic corps, is expected to have participants share knowledge, experiences and best practices elsewhere as well as try to find solutions to avoidable road accidents which occur on our roads. The conference is on the theme: "Road Safety, A Shared and Collective Responsibility." Dr Apea-Kubi said sometimes persons convicted for reckless driving and whose licences had been cancelled only had to change their names, move to other jurisdictions and obtain new ones and get back on the road. "Carriers of multiple identities therefore abound," he said, and added that such inadequacies made the enforcement of vehicle road worthiness a nightmare. He also spoke about institutional obstacles that do not allow the easy flow of information between partners in road safety and asked what prevented the country to use technological devices that would allow information sharing between the Ghana Police Service, the DVLA, NRSC, Customs, Excise and Preventive Service and Immigration Service at a click of a button. Dr Apea-Kubi, however, said no one institution could do it alone, calling on all key players to join forces and work together to reduce road accidents on our roads. Mr Mike Hammah, the Minister of Transportation, said road accidents affected the poor mostly and added that if the Millennium Development Goals and poverty reduction were to be met, then one of the priorities of government must be to reduce road accident, fatalities and injuries. He said cabinet was considering a memo to define in percentage terms the amount of road fund inflow to be assigned to advance the cause of road safety activities in Ghana in the medium to long term since funding for road safety activities had not been encouraging. Mr Justice Morkporkor Yaw Amegashie, Acting Chief Executive of the DVLA, sharing some achievements of his organization and the NRSC, said over the last 10 years since the establishment of the two institutions road accident rates had dropped from 34,000 deaths per 10,000 vehicles to 19,000 deaths per 10,000 vehicles. He, however, said there was still more that could be achieved since road accidents were avoidable. Osagyefo Amoatia Ofori Panin, Okyehene, who chaired the conference, said road safety was an international issue and urged the government to help enforce road traffic regulations.