Extend the polygraph test to our Parliamentarians

May 18, 2008 Features / Columnists

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Lie detector tests are here and they have been put into effect even before the country has legislation to justify their use. The first set of people to undergo the tests are those drug enforcement officers attached to the Customs Anti-Narcotics Unit (CANU) and, according to President Bharrat Jagdeo, quite a few of them have failed the test and will be let go.

The announcement that CANU had a lot of officers who were less than honest now begs the question of how many of the drug busts were legitimate and how many people were actually allowed to smuggle drugs.

But that pales into insignificance when one considers that there are other law enforcement officers who exist in much greater numbers. The country has seen its fair share of law enforcement officers who were less than honest. Scarcely a day goes by without people not talking about traffic ranks who, instead of laying a charge against an errant motorist, would settle for a fee.

Just the other day a reporter quoted a bus driver who sought to justify his decision to fetch overloads. This bus driver argued that he had to make money to pay the police ranks who in turn would allow the overload, regardless of the danger such a practice places other passengers in.

The word is that the lie detector tests would be applied across the entire law enforcement spectrum. The results would be remarkable and Guyana might find itself even more short of law enforcement officers because I shudder to think about the numbers that are going to be let go.

The advent of the lie detector came in a rush. Just the other day the government proclaimed that it could not afford to have some people undergo polygraphs. But I should have known that it would be a matter of time before Guyana secured its own. Perhaps we are the beneficiaries of some developed country who thought nothing about making one available to us.

I wonder whether one of the questions was “Have you helped in the exportation of cocaine?” If those who failed flunked the test over that question there may be a need to further interrogate them but there may be serious problems in prosecuting them.

Last week, when the news was announced, the cynics in our midst readily said, “Hey! Let the Ministers also undergo the polygraph.” That would make for interesting findings. For example, Mr Robert Corbin would be among the first to ask them whether they had secured money through corrupt means.
Of course he is not skilled to do the test but ‘dem boys seh’ that he could write the questions for the interrogator. There is bound to be some failure in the set because as my mother used to say, “You hand ain’t got hair in the middle.”

People take gifts, some of them so large that they would defy any qualification as gifts and there have been Ministers of this and other Governments who have yielded to the temptation of enhancing their welfare.

Just the other day the police caught some of their own. A man reported that they demanded money from him for some favour or the other. What surprised me was the sum. It was so small that no one should have risked their pay and their career for that. Right away I recalled that someone once said that there are people who would take enough money to buy a fry rice or to share a brief moment with a woman in a hotel room.

One major businessman actually spoke of a Minister actually calling on him for “the thing”. I hasten to say that the Minister is no longer there.

The government may also wish to extend the test to all Parliamentarians. “Do you promise to faithfully execute the duties of Member of Parliament? “ The lie detector would jump off the page and so keep many from actually entering the Parliament. That would be a good thing because honesty would be the order of the day. Bills debated would have meaning and people would vote conscientiously.

Joke and fun aside, lie detector tests have long been touted as the key to solving many crimes. The old movies featured polygraphs a lot but for some reason to this day polygraphs are not accepted as legitimate in the courts, and for good reason. But in my book it is a good thing because it would allow me to know with whom I am dealing.
Then it comes to the point of choosing a wife. You get the girl to undergo the test. “Do you love me?” “Will you live with me till death do us part?”
The woman may ask “Have you had any woman since you met me?” Heavens help us because there may also be no relationships.
Someone forwarded a joke to me via e-mail. A husband went out and secured a robot which was a lie detector, and none too soon. His son chose that same day to come home late from school.
“Where were you?” the mother asked. The boy replied that he had gone to the library. The robot immediately whacked him hard. At that point the father said that it was a lie detector.
The questioning continued and each time the boy lied he got smacked hard. He ended up telling the truth. His father then said that it is a good thing that he never lied to his parents when he was young. He got punched halfway across the yard.
His wife burst out laughing and with tears of laughter in her eyes, she said, “This boy is indeed your son.” The robot smacked her not once, but three times.

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