While going through the newly constructed, spacious and beautiful roads in Kaduna, I suddenly came upon a long queue of cars. At first, I thought it was an accident, but as we crawled along, I came upon officials of the Kaduna State Traffic Law Enforcement Agency, KASTELEA, doing their job. I was immediately attracted by their smart, clean uniform and the professional way they appeared to be doing their job.
I was in no way alarmed as I had nothing to fear from them. I always kept my vehicle particulars and driver's license up to date. Not only that, I also kept a fire extinguisher and a triangle in my car just for a day like this. And I had made it a habit to always put on my seat belt. As a matter of fact, I longed to be asked to show my particulars so that I could disappoint traffic officials who hoped to catch me on the wrong side of the law.
So, when the KASTELEA official asked for my particulars, I gladly showed them to him without hesitation and with a patronising smile on my face, confident that I had beaten them once again.
He took his time going through them as if his life depended on it. Then I saw him smiling and shaking his head. Wondering what he found funny, I looked at him enquiringly. He said, "So, you Katsina people are still doing this manually"? I said as patiently as I could, "Doing what, manually"? He explained that if we did our vehicle particulars online, the money would go directly into government coffers. But the way we are doing it now, he was sure most of the money was going into someone's pocket.
I smiled ruefully and said, "Unfortunately, not every state has an El-Rufa'i as a governor". He laughed out loud and waved me on...
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