Don’t submit personal data to National Security – Lands Division Staff

Staff of the Lands Registration Division of the Lands Commission, have expressed their objection to a decision by their management to submit their personal data and information to the National Security apparatus.

In a reply to a circular signed by the Director of the Division, Mrs Rebecca Sittie, the staff numbering about 60, said much as they agreed with the intention to improve the security and safety of the Land Registration Division, they objected to the decision of the management to submit their personal data to the National Security outfit when they had not been found culpable of any offence to warrant investigation.

They pointed out that under the legal system of Ghana one was presumed to be innocent until otherwise proven and said that the Security operatives could utilize their own means to identify culpable staff and subject them to investigation.

In a memo to the Chief Director of the Ministry of Lands and Forestry, the Executive Secretary of the Lands Commission and one DCOP Dzakpata and Mr Decadi Nelson dated November 3, 2011 signed by Mrs Sittie, she said that she requested the Chief Personnel Officer of the Division to send a circular and a copy of personal data form to every member of staff to answer.

She said this followed a meeting with the management of the Division on the exercise, which started Thursday 3rd November.

The Memo said some of the staff raised reservations about the submission of their data to the Nation Security because of suspicion and fears that it could be adversely be used against them.

Mrs Sittie said she arrived in her office in the morning of November 3rd and received a response from some members of staff including some members of management raising their objection to the exercise in which they said that after taking pictures which could be used to trace any of them, they were opposed to the idea of giving their personal data to the National Security.

When contacted in her office by the Ghana News Agency in Accra, Mrs Sittie, who had been in office since 2002, said she was working under the authority of the Chief Director of the Ministry of Lands and the Executive Secretary of the Lands Commission and refused to make any further comment on the matter.

Some of the questions on the 24-point Personality Notes Form, include particulars of parents, marital status and the type of marriage including the date and place of marriage, names and ages of children, if single, residential and business address and occupation or profession of present and or former boyfriend or girlfriend.

Some members of staff GNA spoke to said the Personality Notes Form infringed on their privacy when they had not been found to have fallen foul of the laws of the country and stated that the questions were incursion into their private lives.

Source: GNA

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