Bureaucracy

By Sara:

When Anthony and I were traveling to Kenya for the last TLT training in November, we had our first personal experience of a vehicle accident in Africa.  While the accident itself was very minor - no one got hurt and even the vehicle wasn't badly damaged, the follow-up to the event of the accident turned out to be a long, drawn-out lesson in police bureaucracy.

It all began when a friend was driving us from Soroti to the Uganda border; we had hired someone to drive us from there to Mogotio, the place we were heading in Kenya.  While our friend was driving (remember we're driving on the left side of the road), a truck which was parked on the left shoulder very slowly moved out into the road.  So our friend moved over to the right a bit to go around them, but then the truck started turning to the right, directly in front of us, without signaling.  Our friend tried to slow down and swerve to the right, but it wasn't enough to get out of the way, and the truck slowly scraped the passenger side of our car, until it crushed the passenger side mirror and stopped.  We were all rather in shock and everyone realized it was the other guy's fault, but people came running from all over, and Anthony and I had heard all kinds of stories about accidents happening and then a mob torching vehicles or dragging drivers out and beating them, so we wanted to get away quickly.  Anthony went over to talk to the other driver, but he didn't speak English.  Some of the people around tried to translate between them, and Anthony told him we knew it was his fault, but we forgave him, and agreed to give him some money to repair his vehicle.  As soon as he did that, we drove away quickly and just down the road came to a police checkpoint.  A police officer stopped us and talked to us about what happened.  He called the police department in Mbale, the city we were just about to enter, and told us to go there and talk to the traffic police officer on duty.  (Interesting side note - after that first police officer, all the other police we interacted with in Mbale were policewomen)  In the meantime, I was calling people from World Renew to try to find out what we were supposed to do and also calling an American friend who lives in Mbale, who could help us in person.  We learned that we needed to get a police report in order to submit a claim to our auto insurance. One would think this would be an easy thing to get, but no.  Not only this, but the Kenyan driver was waiting for us at the border and Anthony had a training there beginning the next day...

In the end, after the three of us sat at the police station giving statements (which were all slowly and meticulously written out by hand) for a couple hours, I told Anthony he should continue to Kenya by himself.  My trainings didn't start until Wednesday, so we agreed that Anthony should get there to start TLT the next day and I would figure out the police report and continue to Kenya later.  Anthony felt safe leaving me knowing that our American missionary friend (who has lived in Uganda for decades and has a lot of experience with the police) was around and available to help me if I needed it.  Our friend who had been driving and I spent several more hours getting things photocopied for the police (because they don't have a photocopier at the police station) and going back and forth between different police offices and the copy shops, having them hand write our information, until we had exhausted everything we could do for the day, since it was Sunday.  Then, I walked our friend from Soroti to the bus park so he could get a bus home to Soroti.  I had to leave our vehicle parked at the police station overnight because they said I wasn't allowed to take it out of their sight until I brought it to be inspected the next morning.   So I walked all over Mbale doing various errands and then walked to a guest house, where I spent the night.

The next morning, I showed up at the police station at 8, as I they said I should, and had to sit around for a long time before they got me the paperwork I needed to take to the vehicle inspector.  When I finally was able to go there (with my vehicle), the guy wasn't in yet.  There is only one person for the entire region who can inspect vehicles after accidents and write an official inspection paper for the police and he has this tiny little one-room building.  But since he wasn't there, the guy cleaning the office told me to come back at 11.  So I did, but when I got there, the inspector was teaching about road signs to people who were about to take a driving test with him.  Someone called me over and told me to come back at 2:00 because the inspector was busy until then.  I figured if I left, there was no way I'd get anything done that day, so I said I'd just sit and wait there for the next three hours.  I sat down with the people listening to him lecture on road signs and began to read a book.   After only about 20 minutes, he was trying to get them to explain what a yield sign means and no one could explain satisfactorily.  He said "perhaps the mzungu (me) can tell us."  I figured it would be beneficial to be in his good graces, so I explained what it means to yield.  Apparently it made him happy because shortly after that, he paused the lesson and inspected my vehicle! 

As frustrating as it can be, it is often the best practice to sit patiently and sometimes be a nuisance simply by your presence until people do what they're supposed to do.  I continued in that practice for the rest of the day where I sat in the police station until they got me the form to go to the bank and make a payment for the police report.  Then I came back and waited until they sent a police officer to go to the accident site with me and draw a sketch of the scene and interview witnesses (everyone there agreed it was the fault of the other vehicle, but they wouldn't give up his identifying information to the police).  Then, I waited again while they slowly worked on the police report (typing it up on a typewriter because they don't have a computer).   By the time they were done, at 5pm, they indirectly asked me to give them money and directly asked for lunch since they hadn't eaten lunch. Well, I hadn't eaten lunch either and I had already paid for the report, so I just gave them a daily devotional (Our Daily Bread) and thanked them for the report and slipped out!  The next day, I took public transportation to Kenya and joined up with Anthony there.  It was crazy.  But could have been so much worse.  And now we have a great story.

Also, who would have wanted to break into or steal our vehicle when it looked like this?

The mirror actually hung loosely when the vehicle was moving, so we had to duct tape it to keep it in place.

After all that, it was a while before we were able to take our vehicle to Kampala for repairs.  And in the end, the whole situation resulted in a car which looks brand new.  The people working on it, rather than just re-shaping and painting the damaged side, re-painted the entire vehicle.  Here it is in the workshop: