The enhanced communication era – for good or bad

Aug 14, 2011 Features / Columnists, My Column

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I have had a chance to review many things during this my vacation, and I can say that perhaps the people of Guyana expect too much. In the first place, we do not have the skills to deliver the things we need, and we surely do not have the systems to expedite the process.
Although computers have been in Guyana for nearly thirty years, we are now learning to exploit them. We are introducing high-speed communication cables that would provide among other things, the ability to monitor, in real time, situations in the streets, process vehicles suspected to be stolen without the police ranks getting out of their vehicles, enhancing the judicial process and a host of other things.
It is the judicial system that worries me the most. I happened to be in court when a judge had cause to admonish a lawyer. The lawyer had approached the bench for time to research some decisions. It was the same request for time that has stalled the judicial process. The judge merely informed that there was no need for any postponement, that the decisions were a click away on a computer.
In Guyana, we have numerous cases of more than one vehicle having the same number plate. And the police have seized quite a few but we never hear the outcome. The computer would enable the police to determine which vehicle is illegally registered.
The courts would be able to record criminal offenders and the police would be able to determine one’s criminality with the click of a mouse. Fingerprints would be easily retrieved and matched, and firearms would be readily traced.
Surveillance would now be a breeze. In fact, most business places have surveillance cameras, and it is interesting to note that since these cameras have been established, almost everywhere there has been a decline in certain criminal activity.
But with such developments come certain negative things. I happened to read a newspaper article that stated that policemen took a certain sum of money from a drug dealer and then they proceeded to confiscate the drugs.
It was the same with a policeman who had an inside track on a double murder-robbery of two gold dealers at Bartica. He knew the perpetrators and he benefited from the gains. Had it not been for his greed, the matter might never have been solved, and all (his cohorts) would have been happy. One of the perpetrators had already taken his girl to a top hotel and splurged.
There were other policemen who split the ill-gotten gains from a robbery-murder and when they were caught it transpired that they had already apprehended another set of corrupt cops and were preparing to forego that arrest.
We are now going to have to rely on what honesty exists among the others to get the best possible use from the communication structure that is being erected. Indeed, there will be criminal acts perpetrated by the government. Already we hear of a now Canada-based Guyanese who claimed that he had to flee with his family because he refused to continue to hack into the computers of people deemed to be opposed to the government.
Already, the enhanced communication system is allowing the government as well as criminal elements to listen to anyone they wish.  This has already led to killings and to the ensnarement of people. We have seen reports that were deemed confidential being splashed on the internet by people who have ulterior motives, for political purposes.
There is a law that states that no one should listen in to conversations unless there is an order of court, but that law passes for nothing in Guyana because in the first instance, the people who should preside over the law know nothing about surreptitious spying. The entire situation is beyond control but then again, so too are many things in Guyana.
Yet, the good that will come from the expanded communication system far outweighs the bad. I would like to install security equipment in my home and monitor the premises from anywhere in the world. That is already happening in Guyana.
The greatest good will come to those who are pursuing an academic career. Research has become a dream. Sadly, the need for research is not as high on the agenda as the need to interact on the social network.
Access to the outside world is a click away; nothing is secret. The fact that a man shipped tonnes of building material to the head of state would have been unknown had it not been for the expanded communication system.
This returns us to the need for people with the skills to make the system work for the law abiding. One of my sisters was travelling from Canada to New York. Her husband had left earlier with the family car; she was travelling overland by public transport.
The authorities were able to monitor the cameras at a crossing a few hundred miles away and confirm that her husband’s car had indeed crossed into New York.
We come off the plane at an airport in the United States and we do not recognize that we are under surveillance, not only at the airport, but at every other location that has access to the cameras. Guyana is going to be like that, for better or for worse.
But then again, it would depend on who is doing the monitoring and for what purpose. I don’t mind being under surveillance, although there are aspects of my life that I would prefer to remain under wraps.  But I also know that people in high places would also be under surveillance, so things would even out.

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