Traffic incident with ramifications.
I was travelling, my son was helping in our exhibition, and for the first time we distribute 14 boxes of magazines in the first 2 hours, so he decides to return to pick up more of them, he comes home, says hi/bye to us, we leave to the airport, he leaves to the expo. When I switch my phone on again I receive a string of BBMs from him, that he has been in an accident, not his fault, and a small one, the police drags him to the station, takes his passport, pull the car to the station, and tells him off, anyway after that he hires a pickup, puts the the boxes in it, pays the money and goes to the exhibition. And for the next three days he takes taxis, and tries to find out from here and there what the hell he did wrong so they confiscate the car.
To make the long story short, I accompany him to the court today. I left home at 8, arrived there at 9, waited a bit, the the judge called him and the other driver. The judge charged the lather driver a fine of 1200 dirhams and told my son that he is free to go!!!!! I.e he is innocent, my son's face went blanc, and I was devastated.
What was the problem then? Why did we have to endure thisnincedent? And why did we have to spend all this time? And money of course
Apparently the police dept have different interpretation ofnthe traffic law that says that a visitor to a country can drive with his home driving licence I. A rent a car. Or he can obtain an international licence and drives anyones car. My son was driving my car, and his licence is transfereble to UAE licence without a test, which means he can drive with it, but the policeman didn't stuffy hard enough when he went to the police college, he must have studied enough to pass the exams.
Anyway, I went to recover my car, they told me that I have to pay the 300 drihams toeing money. I did. Then they said I have to picknupnthe car from their wqrehouse and pay another 150 dirhams. I asked where is the warehouse as I am not a good road traveler. He drew a map that even the most experienced driver couldn't reach it, and that too in the most traffic jammed area in the UEA. I had a bomb inside me but I didn't known that it was going to blow up that hard. I shouted at the person and asked to see the manager of the place. He directed me with a shock on his face. I went up, and as usual there were like a hundred people witting to see the manager, I shouted again that I had to see him, and it's urgent, so they directed me in. When he manger saw my face he must have realized that trouble is here, he asked me to sit down and explain, so I went through the steps and ended at the map. I said why did this happen and what are my rights as a citizen? Do I have claims, can I sue the policeman whondid this to my son and I? He said, just bring the paper where the judge said that my son is innocent, and he will sue the policeman! I went back, brought the paper and gave it to him, he called e bigger boss and all the experts on traffic law, they confirmed that we didn't have to go through this. So they took my son Intheir car and went to the wrehouse to pick up a dirty looking car? As it was in the sun, heat and dust for over two weeks.
At the end of all this, my son and I calculated how much this had Cost us in terms of time ( very important) and money. Also the loss of productivity as my son loves that car and was thinking about it all the time, also he could t do his work, and the loss of students, as those magazines would have been distributed and wd could have gotten more students, or as I always put it, more money for the country. We never saved any money in the UAE, nor did we ever send money overseas, in actual fact we receive money from overseas for our work. All that money is circulated and spent in the UAE, not anywhere else.
In conclusion, the cost is over 100,000 dirhams.
Who is responsible? I am not sure
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