More Clarity On Interception

THE interception clause in the Communications Bill should by no means be a threat to law-abiding individuals.

I fully support it and I think the whole nation does too, for the sake of national security and effective combating of crime. I think those that are currently not supporting it, simply do so because they do not understand the provisions and methodology, hence the fear of abuse. Herewith I have tried to explain what I think are the interception procedures to be followed by the Government, if not so already; then what I suggest the Government should consider being the procedures before interception is done on any individual. The provision should be such that; all interception routes be available at the NCIS Centre only in a standby mode at all times and, access or interception should only be activated at the communication providers’ (i.e. MTC, Cell One etc) call centres after successful completion of the following procedures:•NCIS InvestigatorDevelops strong suspicions of an individual, approaches the NCIS Head to have interception instituted against such individual.•NCIS HeadFinds suspicions valid, and approaches the Judge for the permission/ warrant of interception. •The JudgeAfter establishing reasonable grounds, should then grant/reject such request. If permission is rejected, it stops here. If the permission was granted, •NCIS HeadReceives such permission, communicates back and hand the warrant/permission to the NCIS Investigator.•NCIS InvestigatorApproaches the Call Centre Manager at the communication provider company•Call Center managerTogether with the NCIS investigator approaches Call Centre operator to brief him/her and give authority.•Call Centre OperatorVerifies the warrant and activates the interception of that particular target in the presence of the Manager and the Investigators.Interception stops as soon as the investigator is satisfied with the information collected. So how it then is possible for an individual to be well connected to all people involved in all those procedures so as to abuse the interception against his enemies, partners, etc?So if one has nothing to hide, there is no way interception will affect them in any negative way whatsoever. What have any law-abiding individual got lose?Again, it was also clearly said that interception is already legal at the NCIS, and the current bill only seeks to strengthen the NCIS in terms of enabling equipment provision by the communications companies.Penda ShilongoVia e-mail