John Myers, Jr., Staff ReporterAS THE Government moves to tighten security and safety at the country's ports of entry, the Immigration Citizenship and Passport Services has begun installing a new US$2 million high-tech computerised data collection system.
The new immigration system also forms part of the Government's thrust to stem the smuggling of illegal drugs, guns and ammunition, and to curtail the country's spiralling crime rate.
Last week, representatives of the private sector, in presenting a "wish list" of measures to be implemented to tackle the growing problem of crime and violence affecting the country, called on the Government to improve security measures at the island's ports of entry and to monitor more closely persons arriving and departing the island.
ENHANCED CAPABILITY
Leighton Wilson, director of Immigration Services in the Ministry of National Security, said when the new system is installed, the department's capacity and ability to keep track of visitors entering and leaving the island would be significantly enhanced, allowing for greater security and border control.
With the current manual data collection system, Mr. Wilson explained that the Immigration Department has no effective means of tracking foreigners coming into the island.
He said there were instances in which visitors were over-staying their time for years. According to him, "It's a difficult task to quantify how many people are over-staying their time" as the department usually finds out when these persons come in to regularise their status after marriage, in some cases.
The cost of implementing the new system is being funded by the United States Government. The U.S. Ambassador to Jamaica, Sue Cobb, at the signing of the contract in November 2002, said "The project is intended to help Jamaica maintain full control over its borders and will serve as a model for other countries around the world who seek to enhance their ability to regulate the orderly movement of people into and through their countries ...Border security took on a new urgency for the United States as a result of the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington in September."
US ASSISTANCE
In 2002, the U.S. State Department carried out an assessment to determine the effectiveness of Jamaica's border security infrastructure. Based on this assessment, the State Department issued several recommendations, one of which called for a new technologically-advanced border control system which would be able to extract, analyse and monitor information on all persons entering or leaving the island's airports.
The upgrading work on the computer infrastructure used by the Immigration Department is being carried out by the American firm, 3M-AiT. And the International Organisation of Migration (OIM) to work with the National Security Ministry to provide training in the operation and management of the system when completed.
The state-of-the-art system will enable Immigration officials to store information on each visitor to the island, the date and time of entry, as well as time and date of departure, in a central data base.
Mr. Wilson said the Immigration Department would also be able to store criminal records for purposes of local and international law enforcement.
With the new machine-readable passports which are being gradually phased into the system, visitors entering or exiting the airports will be required to pass their passports through a computer, which would process the information encoded on the book, the director of Immigration Services explained.
However, for those with the old passports, the information would be entered manually entered into the system by the immigration officer at the airport. He said the two main airports will be equipped with special computer machines to facilitate the process.
