Better still, the document’s different variations are used as a gauge between drivers. Moreover, it represents access to an economic activity deemed ‘respectable.’ Licences are milestones in careers. Obtaining one is synonymous with a change of status within their profession, their village, and family. For this relatively homogeneous professional group, mainly composed of men of rural extraction lacking in formal qualifications, a driving licence enables them to have a professional career. Drivers have repeatedly demanded, through their union representatives, that the document be considered a diploma in its own right and that, as such, is should not be revoked for mere driving infractions. ![]() Within the profession, the little pink rectangular piece of paper is regularly the subject of claims aimed at adapting its legal status to the uses and the particular significance with which it is invested. Nevertheless, for professional drivers in general, and for El Hadj in particular, the value of a licence represents far more than this alone. For him, as for a large share of the 11 per cent of the Senegalese population who own a driving licence, 1 possessing such a document is above all a way of standing out in the job market. Given the vehicle’s poor condition, he was able to negotiate part of that money going towards purchasing the vehicle. El Hadj pays the vehicle’s owner 10,000 FCFA (CFA francs) per day except on Sundays, or 60,000 FCFA per week. His vehicle is not new, and he cannot go over 60 km/h if he is to avoid losing the exhaust pipe. ![]() A man I will call El Hadj Wane drives one of the 25,000 yellow and black urban taxis that roam the streets of Dakar and its suburbs.
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