The ex­is­tence of covert groups with­in the frame­work of na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty is com­mon. The ca­pac­i­ty to car­ry out op­er­a­tions dis­creet­ly against in­di­vid­u­als with crim­i­nal and harm­ful mo­tives is es­sen­tial for the suc­cess of na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty in­tel­li­gence ef­forts.

While the ne­ces­si­ty of se­cre­cy is in­dis­putable, it is im­per­a­tive that in­di­vid­u­als be­stowed with such great au­thor­i­ty be held to the high­est stan­dards to up­hold the pub­lic’s trust.

The re­cent shake-up in the Strate­gic Ser­vices Agency (SSA) has left the coun­try strug­gling to com­pre­hend its un­der­ly­ing caus­es. How­ev­er, new rev­e­la­tions have emerged, shed­ding light on the fact that the Re­search and An­a­lyt­i­cal Unit (RAU), a T&T Po­lice Ser­vice unit, had been en­gaged in sur­veil­lance of the SSA. This unit, in fact, played a cru­cial role in ex­pos­ing the agency’s ac­tiv­i­ties.

Claims that the RAU was op­er­at­ing un­der the purview of Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty Fitzger­ald Hinds have giv­en rise to fur­ther con­cerns.

Dur­ing the Sen­ate ses­sion yes­ter­day, Mr Hinds faced ques­tions re­gard­ing his po­ten­tial over­sight role, in re­sponse to which he firm­ly stat­ed that Po­lice Com­mis­sion­er Er­la Hare­wood-Christo­pher re­mains ful­ly in charge and that any com­mu­ni­ca­tion to the Ex­ec­u­tive, in­clud­ing to him­self as min­is­ter, is rout­ed through her.

While we ac­knowl­edge the min­is­ter’s re­as­sur­ance in the Sen­ate, we feel it is im­por­tant to ex­er­cise cau­tion re­gard­ing the re­la­tion­ship be­tween spy agen­cies and po­lit­i­cal ap­pointees.

This cau­tion ap­plies re­gard­less of the chan­nel through which com­mu­ni­ca­tion oc­curs.

Al­though Com­mis­sion­er Hare­wood-Christo­pher’s over­sight of this unit makes its op­er­a­tions law­ful, one ques­tions the depth of Mr Hinds’ and the Cab­i­net’s in­volve­ment with this body, giv­en politi­cians’ past mis­use of the coun­try’s sur­veil­lance sys­tem.

The coun­try needs to un­der­stand the spe­cif­ic ac­tiv­i­ties that ne­ces­si­tate a sec­ond spy body in­form­ing the min­is­ter, es­pe­cial­ly con­sid­er­ing tax­pay­ers’ funds are al­ready al­lo­cat­ed to the SSA for con­duct­ing covert op­er­a­tions.

Giv­en the cur­rent crime sit­u­a­tion, it is even more dif­fi­cult to as­sess the ef­fec­tive­ness of two spy agen­cies.

This coun­try has had its share of con­tro­ver­sy over the op­er­a­tions of se­cret bod­ies.

In 2010, the Peo­ple’s Part­ner­ship gov­ern­ment un­cov­ered the un­set­tling truth that the Patrick Man­ning regime had been em­ploy­ing Is­raeli spy gear to spy on or­di­nary cit­i­zens. The en­su­ing par­lia­men­tary dis­cus­sions shed light on the names of politi­cians, ju­di­cia­ry mem­bers, and even jour­nal­ists who had all fall­en vic­tim to wire­less eaves­drop­ping.

With the Resh­mi Ram­nar­ine de­ba­cle in 2011, the ta­bles quick­ly turned against the Peo­ple’s Part­ner­ship.

This in­ci­dent brought to light the ap­point­ment of an un­qual­i­fied civil­ian as the di­rec­tor of the then-Se­cu­ri­ty In­tel­li­gence Agency (SIA, now SSA), a de­ci­sion that then-prime min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar can­did­ly ac­knowl­edged as her most sig­nif­i­cant po­lit­i­cal mis­take at that time.

These are just two rea­sons why re­mov­ing all ob­sta­cles to pub­lic trust in these mat­ters is cru­cial.

Any po­lit­i­cal af­fil­i­a­tion with covert agen­cies, re­gard­less of how dis­tant, must be sub­ject to rig­or­ous scruti­ny to dis­pel any con­cerns re­gard­ing the in­fringe­ment of civ­il lib­er­ties, and no ex­cep­tions must be made in the cur­rent sce­nario.

The min­is­ter and com­mis­sion­er are en­trust­ed with meet­ing the pop­u­la­tion’s ex­pec­ta­tions of trans­paren­cy and ac­count­abil­i­ty in this mat­ter, as the ball once again drops in their court.