Dear Editor,
It amazes me that the Guyana Elections Commission (Gecom), after vigorously arguing and defending the position for a new national identification card, would have allowed an entire process to be completed without using the appropriate quality control protocols to ensure value for money was achieved.
I refer to the photographs on the new national identification cards; numerous cards contain photographs that are unrecognisable which defeats the purpose of picture identification. Many images are so obscured, it is impossible to decipher any distinguishable facial feature. Then in some cases there are those that are just short of a figured outline of a person’s head.
In many cases the staff that used digital cameras, seem to have had no idea of lighting conditions, lens focus length, backlighting, artificial lighting, among the other technical considerations.
Gecom should have ensured that all photographs taken should have had pre-determined standards and specifications; further additional quality control checks should have been done at the stage of printing. I assume these cards may be acceptable for the purpose of voting, but what happens when the ID card is used to transact other business that requires a picture ID?
This development now creates a window of opportunity for all those who have a vested interested in deliberately further delaying the local government election. After government’s provision of hundreds of millions of Guyana dollars for this project, months of planning, training and implementation, Gecom has produced a product that leaves one guessing whose picture is on that ID card.
Yours faithfully,
Ronald Harsawack
