Manning hopes shooting death of Guerra not the start of city gang war

PRIME MINISTER Patrick Manning expressed the hope yesterday that Sunday night’s shooting death of URP official, Mark Guerra, was not the beginning of gang war in Port of Spain.

Manning at the time was on a familiarisation tour of the Social Services Centre at Couva yesterday morning and expressed delight at what he saw. Speaking about the Centre, located along the Campden Road, close to the Couva Health Facility, he said it was relatively new but had the potential of being of tremendous service to the population, especially those living in Central Trinidad. The Centre, which has as its coordinator Natalie Atkinson, decentralises service of a general nature  offered by the Ministry of Social Services. Among the services offered are legal aid, mediation, probation, community telecentre, general library services, NADAPP (National Drug Abuse and Preventive Programme), SHARE (Social Health and Rehabilitative Effort), disability affairs, social displacement and general family services. Manning felt a “centre like this must make a positive impact on the community where it exists bearing in mind what it was offering to the public”.

Later, in response to questions from the media the shooting death of URP official Mark Guerra, Manning said he hoped “this is not the beginning of gang war in Port-of-Spain”. Asked about the would-be terrorist the US Government was looking for in the country, Manning said that it was a matter for the Police. He said he had only superficial information about the  matter, and all he knew so far was what he read in the newspapers. He criticised the BBC report on crime in the country and said it was quite possible that reporters spoke to victims “and carefully selected people”, and gave one side of the picture. Perhaps if the BBC had interviewd others they might have got another aspect of the story, Manning suggested. With respect to Local Government Elections, Manning said it would be held before July 12.