Editorial | Wednesday, 10 December 2008

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Time to investigate data protection abuse

Paul Borg Olivier, the Nationalist Party secretary-general who unwittingly revealed a highly questionable State/party intelligence gathering network last week, has left no stone unturned in his attempt to deflect attention from the real implications of the case.
He has appeared in public in the guise of a martyr, pointing fingers at indiscretions committed by his opposite number in Labour Party (PL), and promising to uncover “earth-shattering” revelations concerning Labour data abuse for the newly appointed Data Protection Commissioner to investigate.
Ironically, in the same breath he has also defended the PL for likewise spying on citizens, arguing that “two rights don’t make a wrong” (but this only raises the question: if it’s not wrong, then why is Borg Olivier complaining in the first place?)
Absurdities aside, his strategy is as transparent as it is predictable. By painting the incident in the context of an “us versus them” scenario, the PN secretary-general hopes to appeal to the party grassroots’ deep-seated aversion to Labour in a bid to win sympathy for himself. Sadly, it might even work among a certain section of the populace… although one would like to think the country has evolved somewhat in recent years, and can now discern when its rights are trampled upon.
However, the real implications of the scandal have little to do with Paul Borg Olivier. Now that the e-mail has been made public, we can all see the extent to which the instruments of government have been intermingled, almost as a single entity, with the internal machinery of the Nationalist Party. And yet, with the exception of Lino Spiteri, few seem to have actually realised what happened.
Party apologists have gone into overdrive to spin the incident out of all recognition – attempting, among other incredible ruses, to turn public indignation onto the already unpopular Jason Micallef for making a “private” e-mail public – but there can be no hiding of a few basic facts. For instance, that the meeting which discussed this information sharing system took place at the PN headquarters in Pietà… and that it was attended by staff members of the Office of the Prime Minister.
More worryingly still, Paul Borg Olivier even urged ministers and parliamentary secretaries to make use of a questionnaire compiled by Charmaine Gerada, an OPM secretary: effectively allowing the PN to benefit from the time and assets of government employees, whose salaries are paid by the State, and not by the Nationalist Party.
That the meeting was also attended by members of the PN core strategy group only makes matters infinitely worse: evidently, the Office of the Prime Minister now considers itself part of the PN strategy team.
As for the “earth-shattering” information about the PL that Borg Olivier has promised to unleash – claiming to possess documentary evidence of the Labour Party’s plan to access private citizens’ medical records, among others – in truth, he needn’t bother. The document to which he refers is one with which this newspaper is very familiar: having quoted extensively from it in a news story on July 2, more than five months ago.
Under the headline ‘Spy on thy neighbour’, MaltaToday ran an article about “Charter 2000”: an internal PL strategy paper which deals specifically with the gathering of citizen’s sensitive personal data without their knowledge (still less consent).
“Collection of information is to be carried out according to the attached form”, the document states, referring to a table to be filled in with the citizens’ ID number, name, date of birth, sex, marital status, workplace, description of job, presumed political preference, and – most upsetting of all – “number of handicapped persons” in the household.
Were his own situation not so hypocritical, Paul Borg Olivier would be right to be outraged. It is indeed a shocking revelation: a veritable indictment of how two political parties, lost in an eternal arms race for power, have utilised a network of volunteers to create an exhaustive profile of the entire electorate, with zero regard for the individual rights of private citizens.
This is an invasive, unwholesome and quite frankly illegal practice; and with good reason, as one need hardly add how dangerous such a database might prove if leaked to commercial entities (for instance, private insurers), who may have an ulterior interest in the health records of private citizens, among other private data. In fact, one can only wonder why the police have not to date investigated such a clear breach of the Data Protection Act.
But even without this inherent risk, the state of affairs speaks volumes about the lamentable disregard for human rights displayed by both the major parties: which incidentally would not be solved merely by the resignation of Paul Borg Olivier, although that would certainly be a step in the right direction.
As things stand, the only beneficial outcome is that both the Nationalist and Labour parties have individually – for their own, purely hypocritical reasons – requested the new Data Protection Commissioner, Mr Joseph Ebejer, to investigate data abuse by political parties.
Thankfully, therefore, the issue is now technically under investigation. It would be wise of both parties to clean up their act without delay, before even more filth leaches out of their closets.

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