Douala: Cleansing the driving school

Some 100 of the approximately 500 driving schools in Douala operate legally. However, the remaining 400 still operate illegally from private homes or without vehicles and signboards. Most accident are said to be caused by motorists who obtained their driving licenses from such unlawful driving schools.

To sanitise the sector, the Littoral Regional Delegate for Transport, Pamela Ayuketa, staff and leaders of driving school unions, began rigorous checks in Douala on March 28, 2016. The checks, which will run till April 2, 2016, will focus on authorisation documents, the location of driving schools according to authorisation, and the availability of vehicles and structures in driving schools.

On the first outing, Pamela Ayuketa gave illegal driving schools a month to comply or face the heavy arm of the law - closure. “Authorised driving schools operating where they are not supposed to will either relocate to the authorised site or shut down within the timeframe,” she reiterated. It was discovered that an authorised driving school that had to operate in Cité des Palmiers in the Douala V municipality according to authorisation instead set up the school at Bali in the Douala I council area.

The President of « Syndicat National des Propriétaires professionnels d’Auto-Ecoles du Cameroun, » Josue Nkokloum, is determined that the bad grains that paint a bad image of the driving school sector will soon be flushed out. “It is time out for illegal driving schools that registered candidates for driving tests through authorised schools. Those who went to such driving schools are responsible for the numerous ghastly accidents on our roads,” he alleged. It is hoped that by May, driving schools in Douala without authorisation would be a thing of the past.