Car Trouble Part III: Into the Bureaucracy

The vehicle had been purchased. That was the easy part.

The chrome bumper shows that they mean business.

Ghanaian bureaucracy is not for the faint of heart. long queues, confusing procedures, indifferent public servants, too many passport photos, forms in duplicate or triplicate, misinformation, corruption. An encounter with a frosty immigration officer at the airport is uncomfortable, but to be at the mercy of the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority (DVLA) is a whole other matter. Mr. O was well-acquainted with the horrors of bureaucracy from his previous visit.

The upside? Mr. O's employer has a local "fixer", who is tasked with the more mundane aspects of working with the Ghanaian public (non-)service for essential affairs, including navigating the byzantine DVLA complex to obtain a driver's licenses and transferring ownership of a vehicle.

Driver's licenses are a curious thing in Ghana - on paper, they are required. However, international driver's licenses are equally valid and citizens of Commonwealth countries can drive for up to 90 days (or so it was told) with their home-country licenses. Whatever the case, when the police stop an expat's vehicle, something will not be "correct", leading to the request for a "dash" (bribe) to sort things out.

Nevertheless, "good" residents will get their local license. And although all paperwork was filled out properly, on the initial visit to the DVLA, the applications were delayed indefinitely because their existing licenses were issued by a sub-national authority, rather than a national. Eventually this was sorted out, but with a great deal of wasted time and effort.

Vehicle transfers can be even worse. In the case of Mr. and Mrs. O's new vehicle, it was co-owned by the seller and their deceased partner. In addition to being slightly awkward, it became a sticking point for the DVLA, who ostensibly were eager to prevent fraud of some sort of esoteric 419 variant perhaps.

It would take a visit to the High Court and presentation of an official will and power of attorney to convince that this old SUV was not being sold as part of a jilted lover's scam. Every stay was another half-step, another form needed, another signature required. This process took a month, in which Mr and Mrs. O could not legally use the vehicle that was parked in their driveway.

Finally, after several visits, the fixer informed them that it was complete. The SUV is now officially in their name and they can travel as they please. Now they just need to worry about insurance, petrol, maintenance, potholes, bad drivers and traffic-choked roads. And so the journey continues...