West Africa’s ECOWAS Brown Card motor insurance will go digital from January 2027

One thousand five hundred and ninety-two claims filed, 352 files paid. Those were the first-half 2026 figures given in Dakar on Tuesday, October 20, by El Hadji Amar Kébé, president of the Senegalese Federation of Insurance Companies (FSSA), for a total of more than 1.6 billion CFA francs (about €2.4 million) paid to victims of accidents involving a vehicle from another country. All of those accidents fall under the Brown Card, West Africa’s shared motor insurance scheme. And the document that proves you have it is about to change.

Winfred Kwasi Dodzih, permanent secretary general of the ECOWAS Brown Card Insurance Scheme, told the opening session of the 42nd General Assembly of the Council of Bureaux that the digital Brown Card should be rolled out across the community from January 2027, Financial Afrik reported. Some 200 delegates from national bureaus, insurance companies and regulators are meeting until Thursday, October 22.

Cover most drivers don’t know they have

The Brown Card was created by a protocol signed in Cotonou on May 29, 1982, modelled on Europe’s Green Card. It covers a driver’s third-party liability outside their home country: damage to property, injuries and deaths caused to others. The system runs on a clearing arrangement. A victim of a crash caused by a foreign vehicle files with the national bureau in their own country, which handles the claim and pays out, then recovers the money from the bureau of the country where the vehicle is insured.

In Senegal, drivers have nothing to do. Since October 1, 2016, every motor policyholder has been entitled to the certificate, which the insurer hands over when the policy is taken out or renewed. Each national bureau sets the price; in 2018, the then head of the Senegalese bureau put it at 500 CFA francs for a card renewed every year, a figure no recent source allows us to update.

Mr Kébé’s figures leave two questions that the published accounts do not answer: whether they cover Senegal alone or the whole scheme, and whether the 352 paid files are among the 1,592 filed over the period. On average, each payment exceeds 4.5 million CFA francs.

A QR code instead of paper

The problem is well known. A paper certificate is hard to check at the roadside, which fuels disputes over cover after an accident and lets forgeries circulate, the Senegalese business news site Le Jecos noted ahead of the meeting. Going digital is meant to make certificates easier to issue and check, smooth data exchange between national bureaus, improve traceability and speed up the handling of cross-border claims.

The regional format has not been spelled out publicly, but two countries offer a preview. Guinea launched the digitisation of its Yellow Card and Brown Card certificates on June 30, 2025. In May 2026, the Guinean insurers’ association APAC, working with the central bank and the national Brown Card bureau, launched a campaign to move motor insurance certificates onto phones: police and gendarmes, equipped with readers, scan a QR code and use the number plate to check whether a vehicle is insured. “That way, nobody will be able to forge it,” said Ibrahima Keïta, APAC’s secretary general, quoted by Guineematin. Senegal, for its part, had begun setting up a digital register of certificates, a platform shared with neighbours such as Mali and electronic border checks using a QR code built into the certificate, Leral reported in August 2025. How far that work has progressed was not made public in Dakar.

« Shorter settlement times and a certificate that can be verified everywhere. »

Winfred Kwasi Dodzih, permanent secretary general of the Brown Card scheme, on what Dakar should deliver (Le Jecos, translated from French)

What Dakar still has to decide

Habib Dia, president of the Council of Bureaux, raised the underlying question at the opening: are the existing structures and mechanisms equipped for today’s demands? He is pushing for institutional reform. The meeting is expected to produce a “Dakar Action Plan” assigning owners, deadlines and indicators to each workstream. Several numbers were still missing on the eve of the meeting, Le Jecos noted: a maximum time to settle a claim, a target share of digital certificates in each country, and a timetable for clearing debts between bureaus.

The assembly ends on Thursday. It is the text of the action plan, not Tuesday’s announcement, that will show whether January 2027 is a firm date for every national bureau or a target each will reach at its own pace. Guinea is already ahead.