A letter I received from a friend recently woke me up to the fact that, contrary to what we believe, women do drive in this country. The proof came from the very people responsible for issuing driving licenses: The Traffic Department.
My friend said when he submitted his daughter’s passport for renewal it was returned to him three days later with a note saying that his daughter will not have her passport renewed until she pays a ticket issued in her name for a traffic violation she committed in Dammam.
My friend, a retired employee of Saudi Arabian Airlines, has worked and lived all his life in Jeddah, not Dammam. The documents nevertheless said that the girl did commit the violation, so my friend had to ask his daughter to tell him the truth. The answer, of course, was no, she has never owned or driven a car.
The puzzled father was then advised to approach the assistant director of the Traffic Department. After offering him a cordial reception, he told him that it was a computer hitch and promised that the mistake would be corrected “very soon”. Jokingly, my friend told the assistance that he would pay SR1,000 instead of the SR150 fine just to be shown which car had been involved in the alleged violation.
In his letter, my friend said that he considered what happened to be yet another example of the many irritating situations we continue to face in our society. Those at the highest echelons of power, he added, wouldn’t tolerate having to suffer something like this. In the meantime, he advised all to be patient and to continue enduring inconvenience.
Two weeks after reporting the case to the traffic authorities, my friend is still waiting for the matter to be resolved.
Arab News From the Local Press 11 January 2003
