The first candidate for the position of Inspector General of Intelligence‚ Professor Bruce Watson’s status as a global citizen put him in a tough spot when Parliament’s Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence grilled him during an interview on Tuesday.
Watson‚ an academic from the University of Stellenbosch‚ has lived in and had passports for South Africa‚ Canada and the Netherlands. The position of Inspector General of Intelligence has been vacant for the better part of a year and a half.
When Parliament released the names of 10 short-listed candidates last week‚ it became clear that former ANC MP Cecil Burgess would no longer be in the pecking order for the job. The first of two days in the interview process began on Tuesday morning.
The inspector general will be accountable to the committee and the president of the country for the work of his office and must report to the committee on the overall function of the office at least once a year.
Watson was born in Zimbabwe and studied at institutions such as the University of Waterloo in Canada‚ as well as the Eindhoven University of Technology and De Baak Management Institute in the Netherlands.
His work experience includes Microsoft as a software compiler and as a chief technical officer at Sagantec in the Netherlands. His areas of expertise include cyber security‚ big data and data science as well as knowledge dynamics and algorithmics.
Watson told the joint standing committee that he had been a South African all his life but emigrated to Canada in early years. He said his father’s family was of mixed race‚ which was one of the reasons the family opted to leave.
Asked whether he considered himself South African‚ he affirmed that he considered himself a South African primarily and that he was prepared to give up his citizenships in the Netherlands and Canada if these were an obstruction to his becoming Inspector General.
“I have an SA passport which I use extensively. I view myself as a South African in terms of function and loyalty. I have dual citizenship with Dutch and Canadian citizenship. I am prepared to do what I have to do to ensure that this does not remain an issue for the committee or my prospects‚” said Watson.
Questions abounded over Watson’s nationality. Committee member for the ANC‚ Dumisani Gamede pointed out that when one applies one of the requirements is that the preferred candidate be a South African.
Watson replied‚ “My primary citizenship is South African. I have three valid passports. I primarily use the SA one to travel. I have a Netherlands one which I use to get around the EU for visa-fee travel and will expire soon. The Canadian passport is used to travel to Canada or the United States so that I did not have to be fingerprinted‚ which is something I disagree with“.
Watson said one of the priorities he identified for himself within the intelligence space was ensuring that state intelligence stayed in beat with new technologies and made use of multiple forms of data and intelligence at once. — TMG Digital
Spy watchdog candidate's multiple passports prompt a grilling from MPs
The first candidate for the position of Inspector General of Intelligence‚ Professor Bruce Watson’s status as a global citizen put him in a tough spot when Parliament’s Joint Standing Committee on Intelligence grilled him during an interview on Tuesday.
Watson‚ an academic from the University of Stellenbosch‚ has lived in and had passports for South Africa‚ Canada and the Netherlands. The position of Inspector General of Intelligence has been vacant for the better part of a year and a half.
When Parliament released the names of 10 short-listed candidates last week‚ it became clear that former ANC MP Cecil Burgess would no longer be in the pecking order for the job. The first of two days in the interview process began on Tuesday morning.
The inspector general will be accountable to the committee and the president of the country for the work of his office and must report to the committee on the overall function of the office at least once a year.
Watson was born in Zimbabwe and studied at institutions such as the University of Waterloo in Canada‚ as well as the Eindhoven University of Technology and De Baak Management Institute in the Netherlands.
His work experience includes Microsoft as a software compiler and as a chief technical officer at Sagantec in the Netherlands. His areas of expertise include cyber security‚ big data and data science as well as knowledge dynamics and algorithmics.
Watson told the joint standing committee that he had been a South African all his life but emigrated to Canada in early years. He said his father’s family was of mixed race‚ which was one of the reasons the family opted to leave.
Asked whether he considered himself South African‚ he affirmed that he considered himself a South African primarily and that he was prepared to give up his citizenships in the Netherlands and Canada if these were an obstruction to his becoming Inspector General.
“I have an SA passport which I use extensively. I view myself as a South African in terms of function and loyalty. I have dual citizenship with Dutch and Canadian citizenship. I am prepared to do what I have to do to ensure that this does not remain an issue for the committee or my prospects‚” said Watson.
Questions abounded over Watson’s nationality. Committee member for the ANC‚ Dumisani Gamede pointed out that when one applies one of the requirements is that the preferred candidate be a South African.
Watson replied‚ “My primary citizenship is South African. I have three valid passports. I primarily use the SA one to travel. I have a Netherlands one which I use to get around the EU for visa-fee travel and will expire soon. The Canadian passport is used to travel to Canada or the United States so that I did not have to be fingerprinted‚ which is something I disagree with“.
Watson said one of the priorities he identified for himself within the intelligence space was ensuring that state intelligence stayed in beat with new technologies and made use of multiple forms of data and intelligence at once. — TMG Digital
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