It is abun­dant­ly clear that some­thing is very wrong with the way can­di­dates for po­si­tions on en­quiry and oth­er com­mis­sions are vet­ted.In the case of the Com­mis­sion that is in­quir­ing in­to the 1990 at­tempt­ed coup, the Gov­ern­ment has de­ter­mined the frame of ref­er­ence and the type of peo­ple who should com­prise the Com­mis­sion.But it ap­pears that lit­tle or no thought has been giv­en to the lev­el of se­cu­ri­ty clear­ance that ap­pointees must sat­is­fy.

De­vel­oped coun­tries have put in place se­cu­ri­ty clear­ance lev­els that are re­quired for var­i­ous po­si­tions. These lev­els are con­fi­den­tial, se­cret, top se­cret and need to know. Each lev­el has a cor­re­spond­ing set of ques­tions that have to be in­ves­ti­gat­ed be­fore clear­ance is giv­en.A con­fi­den­tial check of the in­for­ma­tion pro­vid­ed by a can­di­date is usu­al­ly done by tele­phone or e-mail or both.

Se­cret and top se­cret checks are field checks. They are ex­ten­sive and take time. They probe a can­di­date's cre­den­tials, in­for­ma­tion about his fam­i­ly, friends, and po­lit­i­cal af­fil­i­a­tions be­fore he is cleared.A per­son who has a need-to-know clear­ance has al­ready been cleared to top se­cret.

What is the lev­el of se­cu­ri­ty clear­ance that ap­plied to mem­bers of the 1990 Com­mis­sion? Sure­ly it could not be con­fi­den­tial be­cause mem­bers of the Com­mis­sion would have to be pro­vid­ed with sen­si­tive state in­for­ma­tion and will be lis­ten­ing to tes­ti­mo­ny that might have to re­main se­cret. This calls for them to be cleared ei­ther at se­cret or top se­cret lev­el.

A non-cit­i­zen will nev­er pass a se­cu­ri­ty check at the se­cret lev­el be­cause you can­not rea­son­ably re­pose any trust in him or pros­e­cute him un­der an of­fi­cial se­crets act for leak­ing in­for­ma­tion from the in­quiry. So the es­teemed Sir An­tho­ny Sim­mons, not be­ing a cit­i­zen of T&T, has no busi­ness on the Com­mis­sion, even if he is oth­er­wise qual­i­fied.

It is high time that the Prime Min­is­ter es­tab­lish a se­cu­ri­ty unit to set lev­els of se­cu­ri­ty clear­ance for ap­point­ments to boards, the civ­il ser­vice, and com­mis­sions of in­quiry, and to do the re­quired check­ing. This is not a task that should be left to novices.

Den­ni­son Moore

Ot­tawa, Cana­da