Privacy and number plates

I had an exchange with the Rookie Manager yesterday on the nature of privacy and motor vehicle number plates. I think there is a great misunderstanding of what privacy means. Article 31 does much to delineate the line between private and public. The question the Rookie Manager asked was in relation to the information that would be contained on the next-generation number plates, including the owner's name. The Rookie Manager wanted to know whether car owners deserved no privacy?

Privacy is not the right not to be known. Taking the template provided by Article 31, privacy is the right not to be searched, or your home or property searched; it is the right not to have your possessions seized; it is the right not to have information relating to your family or private affairs unnecessarily required or revealed; and it is the right not to have the privacy of your communications infringed.

When you operate a motor vehicle on public roads, it is not a private act. The vehicle might be privately owned, but the act of operating it in a public road is a public act. The public road is not the motorist's private domain; the motorist shares it with other motorists and pedestrians. What one motorist does on the public road affects other road users. It is, of necessity, a public act with private property. It follows, therefore, that if you perform a public act, you cannot hide your identity. However, the manner in which your identity is revealed is intended to protect you from harm too; that, I believe, is why the next-generation number plates will contain bar codes which will contain your identifying information and which will require bar-code readers to divulge that information.

One way to demonstrate that your identity is not a private matter when you operate a motor vehicle on a public road is the manner in which you are facilitated to operate that motor vehicle. To do so, one must comply with various requirements, primarily designed to protect you, the motorist, and other road users. The vehicle must be roadworthy. The vehicle must be insured. The vehicle must be registered. The vehicle must have affixed on it, in the front and the back, number plates. The motorist must possess a valid driving license. 

These requirements are enforced by public institutions such as the National Police Service, the Department of Motor Vehicle Registrations, the Kenya Revenue Authority and the Judiciary. It would be perverse for a policeman to stop a motorist for a suspected traffic offence and the motorist refused to identify himself or refused to confirm whether he owned the motor vehicle in the first place. But unless the policeman suspected that the motor vehicle had been used in the commission of another offence and that there was proof of the offence inside the vehicle, he would have no right to search the vehicle, which remains private property. Therefore, he could not enter the vehicle.

There seems to be a national apprehension that our privacy is being whittled away by the State and its institutions. But for us to debate the matter effectively, we must understand, taking into account Article 31 and Article 24 which limits fundamental freedoms and rights, what privacy is and, crucially, what it is not.