GULU, Uganda — Police in the Aswa West region have raised alarm over a growing trend where buyers of second-hand motorcycles and vehicles fail to transfer ownership documents, leaving them vulnerable to legal trouble and financial loss in the event of an accident.
According to Mr. David Ongom Mudong, the Aswa West Police Public Relations Officer, an alarming 40 percent of vehicles involved in accidents and subsequently impounded by police cannot be released to their claimants. The reason, he says, is simple but costly: the person in possession of the vehicle is not the legal owner on paper.
“Nothing shows that the persons claiming them own them legally,” Mudong explained. In many cases, buyers and sellers only sign a private agreement, which police do not recognize as proof of ownership.
Mudong has therefore urged anyone who buys a used motorcycle or vehicle to immediately change the name in the logbook to their own. “Otherwise, in case of any incident, the real owner can turn around and call you a thief,” he warned. “You have nothing to do about it because the documents are not in your name. Instead, you can be arrested for theft.”
The transfer process requires both buyer and seller to act jointly. They must submit identification details and a signed sale agreement to the national revenue authority (such as the Uganda Revenue Authority), pay the prescribed transfer fees, and then wait for a new logbook to be issued.
Police emphasize that this is not merely bureaucratic formality but a critical legal shield for buyers. Without the transfer, a buyer risks losing both the vehicle and their freedom.
As Mudong put it simply: “People buy and don’t bother to do so. That must change.”
