Digital IDs will not help fight terror

Kenyans are set to be registered afresh to enable the government to create an online database of all citizens above the age of 12. The government wants to pretty much track you electronically from your cot to your coffin, and this is for your own good.

At 12, you are too young for Facebook to have your details and sell them to advertisers, but you are old enough for the government to get to know you, apparently.

The way it was announced means that the government will brook no dissent. At a glance, government officials with access to the system will be able to tell how much you earn and, given the security services’ unequalled appetite for the backhander, we can only expect this to be perverted for their benefit.

Kenyans will be required to reissue the government with information it already has, like fingerprints and photos, to create these new IDs. Why does it need the information again?

The ID cards will be used to identify where a person lives and, interestingly, what they own, according to Information Communication and Technology principal secretary Joseph Tiampati.

Here, I suggest that all patriotic Kenyans take a lead from the top. The president has been reluctant to tell the ICC what he owns, so why should how anyone organises his or her financial affairs be the business of the state?

Besides, should a new system not piggyback on existing systems rather than be constructed from scratch? 

We are told that digital IDs will help in the fight against terrorism. How? “All registers will be consolidated into a single one with accurate information,” the deputy president told us. 

I presumed he would be okay with government agencies using multiple registers to identify people. I mean, the IEBC organised an election — which he won — using multiple registers. What is good for the election apparently is not good enough for immigration.

Let us examine the idea that ID cards could help prevent terrorism. The terrorism that we face cannot destabilise the state; it merely seeks to instil fear. The best defence against these criminals is to maintain a stiff upper lip and refuse to be terrified.

That, and targeting the funders of the attacks. The government is using our fear to chuck loads of money into that black hole titled “For Security”, and digital ID cards are the latest wheeze.

Do not be surprised if the budget suggests that we spend more on security and the military. We will end up with extravagant weapons to face off modest threats. You do not send tanks and frigates against those running through our churches with Kalashnikovs and grenades.

Compulsory ID cards linked to databases did not prevent terror bombing in Madrid, Spain. CCTVs did not stop bombing in London, England. Police were able to tell the 9/11 hijackers’ identities in hours. Their papers were all in order. Digital IDs would be absolutely useless against home-grown terrorists like Elgiva Bwire.

What we need are more police and intelligence officers to smoke out these individuals, not new shiny IDs to stop Al-Shabaab. We could get new cards and all that will mean is that Al-Shabaab will need better forgers.

If you can make technology to print cards legally, it is just a matter of time before your enemies figure out how to make them illegally. We seem to have entered the Second Act of the Jubilee tragedy.

You see, apart from the devolution of power, there will be, alongside it, centralisation of all data. (I missed that part of their harmonised manifesto). I am concerned about the creeping authoritarianism displayed by our leaders. The “I believe” dove is mutating into a hawk, and the talons are showing. The sinews are stiffening, with the Kusema na Kutenda horn having become a club.

When leaders run out of ideas, they become defenders against terrorism or imaginary enemies. Here it is no longer “I believe”; it has become “We shall overcome.” Hope and belief helped them forward but now security without justice shall be their shield and defender. They campaigned in poetry and now govern in prose.

The hope and belief wagon careered into a ditch. The money, it seems, ran out. The jobs were only for the boys and not the other half-a-million who are not hangers-on.

The political will has faltered. The long term is imponderable. So, the government is pushing the security agenda hard, particularly after the Westgate fiasco. Unable to midwife a better tomorrow, they want to protect against an ugly today.

We have an almost exotic surrealism of the things that we are told threaten to attack our country. The enemy is within, we are told. So we self-flagellate the uneasy coexistence between tribes and religions. Now we need IDs to help combat terrorism despite the fact that there is no persuasive argument that they work.

The larger the database, the more likely the false matches and other technological glitches. A national database of millions means that errors, though statistically insignificant, will be in the hundreds, if not thousands.

The innocent are the ones with the most to worry about if glitches occur. There are those who will be accused of not being who they claim to be or those who are told they are someone they are not. Remember how digital identification technology failed us during the elections?

Cicero’s question springs to mind: Cui Bono? Who benefits? Is it not the guys who will be awarded the tenders? I am surprised that it will cost “only” Sh8 billion. Compared to other projects, this is pocket change. 

Digital IDs do not promote social justice or fairness. In fact, considering the religious profiling, they might be hurdles to justice. The only attraction that this thing has to the ruling class is its digital nature.

People who are unsafe on the street want more police officers, not another shiny card in their wallets. Think of what the government could do with the Sh8 billion. How many policemen could be hired?

As Ghana learnt, biometric systems are not foolproof. Those with calloused fingers had problems getting their details into the system. But our dynamic duo — or gruesome twosome (I guess what you call them depends on your sympathies) — at the top are enthralled by all things shiny and digital.