The traffic police department in Western Bahr el-Ghazal State has given motorists till the end of the year to renew and convert their vehicle logbooks and driving licenses to the new ones with the new South Sudan Code, SSD.
In June, the traffic police department started issuing the new SSD driving permits and logbooks in Wau after receiving the requisite machinery from Juba. Before that, the documents were only issued in Juba.
According to the state director of traffic Brigadier Jeremiah Maker Nai, “all drivers should immediately report to the traffic police office in Wau to process their documents.”
He said the new documents are now available in Wau at reasonable prices.
“The permit machines have been available in Wau for 4 months now. All are SSD which is the South Sudan code. If your logbook is written Bahr el-Ghazal, consider it not valid,” Gen. Maker explained. “Because, currently if you for example want to go to Uganda with Bahr el-Ghazal logbook in your vehicle, you will not be allowed to pass because our official logbook is SSD. So I am urging all the citizens to come and change their permits to SSD, including Bodaboda riders,”
He said that the cost of the new documents is not exorbitant as the public claims and that most of the money goes to the company producing them and to insurance companies.
“If you want to get a new drivers’ permit, it will cost you 27,000 SSP, and those who want to renew will pay 21,000 SSP and all this money goes directly to the companies and revenue authority,” Gen. Maker said. “We (traffic police) only take 3,000 SSP as processing fees. Those companies were brought by the national government.”
On the overall traffic situation in the state, he revealed that the police registered seven fatalities and nine injuries as a result of motor accidents in the last couple of months.
“Concerning traffic accidents, last month we registered two deaths and this month we have one including nine people who were injured. One month ago there was an accident between Mapel and Wau in which four people lost their lives,” He added.
Gen. Maker cautioned drivers and bodaboda riders on speeding in towns.