If the Bureau of National Investigations (BNI) is not stopped no telephone conversation in Ghana can be considered safe. An innocent telephone call to a concubine or discussion with a business partner over how to submit a better bid than a competitor for a contract may end up on the recording machines of the BNI.

This is because the BNI has acquired Motorola equipment for tapping telephones on a mass scale. Experts say that with the kind of equipment, which the BNI has acquired, the only telephones it may find difficult to tap are mobile phones.

Late last year, the BNI was frantically searching for the technical expertise, which would enable it to tap mobile phone calls. It is still not clear if the BNI has managed to find that expertise.

Although the equipment was purchased by the Rawlings regime, it is available to the Kufuor administration and no one can tell whether it will be used or not. Many human rights watchers say that if mass telephone tapping is allowed it could very easily lead to the establishment of a police state in which the right of the individual to privacy would be trampled on.

Miss Esther Molly Nkrumah, a human rights watcher told the "Weekly Insight" that it is important for Parliament to take appropriate steps to regulate the use of telephone tapping equipment to protect the individual's right to privacy. In the US, there are clear guidelines for the use of telephone tapping equipment.

It is an offence to tap the phones of citizens without justification. Security sources say that apart from the BNI, a number of foreign diplomatic missions in Ghana have also acquired the capacity for tapping telephones.

The regulation of the use of telephone tapping equipment in the country will be a giant step in realising the promise of the Kufuor administration to guarantee personal freedoms.