You don't buy a car here, you WORK for it

                Theresa mentioned in the last post the exciting news that we have finally purchased a car, a huge step forward on the freedom front – freedom to roam some of the beautiful Ghanaian countryside, and freedom from absolute dependence on tro-tros and taxis (much as we sometimes love them both) for every move in town.

                But the casual way she mentioned it MAY have made it sound like we wandered over to our local dealer, picked out a car, and drove away that afternoon.

                You don’t really think it was like that, do you?

                We learned a lot, for better and sometimes for worse, in that month-long process. There are car dealerships here, but as in the States, they are overpriced; and as with everything else commercial, there is a huge alternative “marketplace,” consisting of small operations with as few as one or two cars for sale along the side of the road to larger ones with parking lots full. Many of those vehicles – most, we think – aren’t owned by the person who runs the lot; he has them on consignment from the real owner, which of course complicates the bargaining.

                There is also a pretty good Internet car-trading site. We (especially T.) spent a lot of time on that, and we both went around with driver-friend Kwame and mechanic Gregory to look at maybe a half-dozen or more cars individually. In the end, we settled on one we found on a notice board in the U.S. Embassy, offered by a young woman who is being transferred to China and wisely doesn’t want her car there. It’s quite new, very low mileage – Gregory was drooling over it.

                But finding and settling on the car was the easy part. We not only had to get it registered – we’d been warned how challenging that would be – but we had to pay the Customs duty on it, since it had been imported as a diplomatic vehicle exempt from such things. And now the “fun” begins.

                I went with helper-facilitator-translator-driver Gabriel to the Customs office. We were met at the gate by two guys with badges around their necks; apparently it’s required that they accompany you into the labyrinth within as “fixers” and guides. (Can you hear the sound of “ka-ching” in the background?)

Supposedly this would be a straightforward process, since the Embassy had done all the paperwork establishing the car’s value and had received official approval and documentation of the fees due. But our very first stop was at an office where shaking of heads and knitting of eyebrows ensued. We only had one original signed copy of a certain form; we needed two. (This was the fault of the seller, but we didn’t know it at the time.) Worried, stern looks all around. Suggestions that we would have to leave and return once we had found the other form. Steam starting to rise from my ears.

And then – a Customs officer emerges from the building. One of the fixers points to him and says, he is willing to accept this single form. But you need to give him 20 cedis (roughly $15). The money changed hands; seemed like a tiny amount, considering the duty was more like 3,000 cedis.

But it DID make me smile, ruefully, as we proceeded to the very next office on our route, which had a sign next to its door (see accompanying photo). Hmm, I wondered. Was the 20 cedis a bribe? Was it just “appreciation,” as they like to say? Was I a criminal now?

This was the start of what turned out to be four nearly full days of navigating the bureaucracy – two days at Customs, and two more doing the vehicle registration. It was alternately maddening, hysterically funny, baffling, horrifying. I had Gabriel’s help through the Customs part; and we hired a guy whose business is to get people through the registration part. Evidently, while you CAN do that yourself, those who are on their own will wait the longest, while those with fixers – who understand the system and, presumably, have greased some wheels – get through more quickly.

In the end, I had made “appreciation” payments totaling roughly 60 cedis to: that first Customs officer; the two “guides”; the person at the official vehicle inspection station who actually inspected the car (after first paying the official FEE for the inspection, naturally); and the woman who picked up our paperwork from the guy who inspected the car. (As we left, the fixer pointed to a group of people sitting in the shade. They had not paid “appreciation,” he said. They had been sitting there for several hours and might not leave until the end of the day.) We had paid an unexpected, but apparently legal, fee of 300 cedis for the expediting firm that types in the official Customs paperwork; the cost of hiring Gabriel (and tipping him, which he richly deserved) for two long stints at Customs; and the cost of the guy who helped with the registration – well worth it, but that didn’t make it less aggravating. I had openly lost my temper once, resulting in alarmed looks and soothing gestures from the fixer and the officer in question alike (and also, I think, the results I was looking for).

The funniest part, I suppose, was at the very end. Theresa was with me for the fourth and final day of this trip through bureaucratic hell, and our final stop was a little area next to the registration office, where the fixer would attach our new plates. This turned out to be the Vehicle Accessories And Everything You Might Want Plus Many Things You Don’t Want marketplace. There were booths for insurance companies, and then, roaming around like schools of piranhas, guys selling it all: floor mats, wiper blades, key chains, seat covers, fancy hub caps, and on and on. Before I knew what was happening, one guy had nearly finished installing a new steering-wheel cover. Another guy had a can of spray paint ready to spiff up our tires, apparently.  Theresa bargained excellently and got us some floor mats, which we needed, but we mistakenly did NOT purchase a fire extinguisher, which we later learned is a required item here. It was a madhouse, but entertaining nonetheless.

At the end of this, exhausted but thrilled to have our car, we couldn’t help thinking: We have just had a tiny look inside what ordinary Ghanaians have to deal with in so many areas of their lives. Numerous people have told us how infuriating it is to go through things like the car-registration process, filled with its inefficiencies, byzantine procedures, and “appreciation” fees. They know about the waste of time and resources; and how much better off their people would be if all this would disappear.

They just don’t know how to make that happen – and without strong demands for it from the top, we don’t know how it will happen, either.