UNC: Manning, Bakr ‘family affair’

THE OPPOSITION UNC yesterday scoffed at Prime Minister Patrick Manning’s statement about the Jamaat-al-Muslimeen still being a threat to Trinidad and Tobago’s national security and Government employing all strategies necessary to ensure national stability and security.

Speaking at a post-Cabinet news conference at Whitehall on Thursday, the Prime Minister denied that the Government had relations which were “too cosy” with either the Jamaat or any of its splinter groups.  Manning also denied that any Government Minister was acting as a liaison with the Jamaat or its splinter groups or his Cabinet was divided over the Jamaat. UNC chairman Wade Mark said the Prime Minister’s utterances only serve to reinforce the Opposition’s longstanding beliefs that “Mr Manning is still in bed with these gentlemen. “This should not come as a surprise to the national community. They (PNM, Jamaat-al-Muslimeen) belong to the same arrangement,” Mark declared.  He added that the controversy surrounding a particular structure in the Laventille area was part of “a family squabble between Mr Manning and Mr Bakr.”

On Sunday, members of the TT Defence Force were reportedly set to demolish the structure but the Prime Minister intervened and it was subsequently agreed that the structure would be used as a community centre. Mark recalled that the UNC warned the Government repeatedly about a terrorist presence in TT but Manning held fast to the position that no such presence existed in this country. The UNC chairman questioned what would now be the role of the newly-formed Special Anti-Crime Unit of TT when “the biggest threat to national security” is the Prime Minister, through “his actions and antics.”

Mark also charged that Manning had violated TT’s integrity laws by accepting a private flight from Spanish energy company Repsol and contradictory statements between Manning and Repsol representative Pedro Vaticon on this issue showed that “somebody is lying.” He said  according to a document entitled “Principles of Integrity in Public Life, published in 2003 by the Integrity Commission, Manning was guilty of a serious offence as far as receipt of gifts and hospitality which “should not be accepted when a company is seeking to expand its relations with the Government by tender or by contract.”