Opinion: When FRSC officials no longer recognise genuine driver’s licence

This article should have been written at the very spot where the incident unfolded as I was boiling above 100 degree Celsius then. Now that I’m back to being an iced water, hoping the message will still carry the weight I really want it to.

It all happened on a cool Sunday afternoon (17th April, 2016) as I was driving down from Lagos towards Ore.On reaching the Sagamu interchange I was flagged down by these FRSC officials. Assuming they were men who should know what they were doing, I stopped and yielded myself to all their checks.

I was asked for my vehicle papers, driver’s licence, caution sign, fire extinguisher and spare tire…all of which I produced. Only for the rookie attending to me to say that it seems my licence is fake and he would want to show it to his boss (my licence currently being a temporary).

And then the supposed boss, with his ancient wisdom, collected the licence and after a scrutinizing look said the licence is ‘confirmed fake.’ I was bewildered knowing the stress I went through to get captured at the FRSC office in Akure, and then I started wondering if the FRSC can indeed issue a fake licence.

For about 30 minutes I explained to this congregation of jokers (both newbie & boss) how I went through the process of capturing and all that. Adamantly they drowned my explanations with their convictions…one named Aribisala was even shouting me down as if he was high on something cheap, warning me of how I would pay 20000 naira if I’m booked for the offence.

After a prolonged ‘back and forth’ argument, one shouted that we should start going to their office for a verification. Convinced of the authenticity of my licence, and now tired of trying to convince them, I entered the car and drove down with them. Unsurprisingly, almost all of them still climbed their van and started escorting me down (perhaps thinking in their minds that ‘pepper don red’).

On getting to their office, my licence ID No was imputed into their portal and right there before our ‘korokoro’ eyes my data popped up confirming the authenticity of the licence.

Angrily I looked at these FRSC officials, the very emblem of all that is ‘ineptitude,’ who can’t identify a fake driver’s licence expecting an apology.

Instead, they started smiling at me patronisingly talking about how we’re all now sure of the authenticity of the licence, bla bla bla…after wasting so much of my precious time, harassing me and causing me so much embarrassment.

As they were spitting their craps, so many thoughts and questions started rushing into my mind:

*How come these Sagamu Interchange FRSC officials can’t recognise a driver’s licence with their so called years of experience?

*Was it that they were badly trained or they failed to absorb the trainings they were given?

*Are there indeed universal control markers on the so called temporary driver’s licence in the country?

*Does the FRSC train its own to say sorry after wrongly harassing citizens?

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Op–ed pieces and contributions are the opinions of the writers only and do not represent the opinions of Y!/YNaija

Soyombo Ayomikun tweets from @alabaster85

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