Manning rejects PNM report’s claims of declining support in constituency - Trinidad Tribune – Latest

Sascha Wil-son
Se-nior Re-porter
-[email protected]
San Fer-nan-do East MP Bri-an Man-ning has re-ject-ed claims that sup-port for him with-in the con-stituen-cy is dwin-dling, fol-low-ing a re-port by an in-ter-nal Peo-ple’s Na-tion-al Move-ment (PNM) com-mit-tee sug-gest-ing the par-ty’s long-held strong-hold could be un-der threat.
Man-ning in-sist-ed yes-ter-day that San Fer-nan-do East re-mains “rock sol-id” and ques-tioned the tim-ing and fo-cus of the re-port.
He spoke dur-ing a back-to-school ini-tia-tive in the Tar-o-dale com-mu-ni-ty, or-gan-ised by con-stituen-cy area man-ag-er Josi-ah Black-burn, where chil-dren re-ceived free hair-cuts from Man-ning and pro-fes-sion-al bar-bers Marcelin Robert and Seon Small.
The re-port, re-port-ed ex-clu-sive-ly in yes-ter-day’s Sun-day Guardian, not-ed that Man-ning won the con-stituen-cy, which has been held by the PNM since it was cre-at-ed, by 673 votes in the last gen-er-al elec-tion, com-pared with a vic-to-ry mar-gin of 5,173 votes in 2020.
Asked about the find-ings, Man-ning said, “It’s fun-ny that I re-port to the par-ty that the con-stituents are con-cerned about cer-tain ac-tiv-i-ties with-in the con-stituen-cy, and their re-sponse is to write a re-port on every-thing but the is-sue that I brought to the at-ten-tion of the par-ty.
“I find it very strange, and I think every-one finds it very strange. They spend more time talk-ing about the per-son who made the re-port and the ac-cu-sa-tion than the per-son who should have been the sub-ject of it. You would have to ask them why.”
Re-fut-ing sug-ges-tions that his sup-port base is weak-en-ing, Man-ning said the elec-tion re-sults alone were not an ac-cu-rate mea-sure of sup-port.
“Not at all. We just won an elec-tion in which San Fer-nan-do East is now the on-ly PNM con-stituen-cy from To-co to Ica-cos. We are sur-round-ed by UNC con-stituen-cies,” Man-ning said.
“There are per-sons in the ex-ec-u-tive right now who lost rel-a-tive-ly mar-gin-al or safe seats by al-most 4,000 votes, yet they are in se-nior po-si-tions in the par-ty. So I don’t know why the last elec-tion re-sult could be used as a barom-e-ter of sup-port with-in the con-stituen-cy.
“I promise you that is ac-tu-al-ly not the case. San Fer-nan-do East is rock sol-id, and we are with the Peo-ple’s Na-tion-al Move-ment and we re-main that way.”
Man-ning point-ed out that oth-er PNM MPs se-cured vic-to-ry by even nar-row-er mar-gins.
“San Fer-nan-do East is the on-ly PNM con-stituen-cy out-side of the East-West Cor-ri-dor. Why are you pick-ing on me?
“We had no sup-port. Our chair-man was in an-oth-er con-stituen-cy fight-ing an elec-tion in To-ba-go, which she lost. There were al-le-ga-tions of a no-vote whis-per cam-paign na-tion-al-ly by some per-sons with-in the par-ty, and we were sur-round-ed by UNC con-stituen-cies. De-spite all of that, San Fer-nan-do East is still red. So why pick on me?”
Speak-ing about a re-cent gen-er-al mem-ber-ship meet-ing, Man-ning said mem-bers were over-whelm-ing-ly sup-port-ive.
He said many con-stituents had raised con-cerns about the ac-tiv-i-ties of var-i-ous mem-bers of the San Fer-nan-do East ex-ec-u-tive who were even-tu-al-ly forced to re-sign.
He said mem-bers now want a new ex-ec-u-tive in whom they can place their trust and con-fi-dence.
Man-ning said he had raised con-cerns with the par-ty’s ex-ec-u-tive on be-half of con-stituents re-gard-ing con-stituen-cy ac-tiv-i-ties, ex-ec-u-tive elec-tion mat-ters and for-mer con-stituen-cy chair-man Pa-tri-cia Alex-is.
Re-it-er-at-ing his ob-jec-tions to the ex-ec-u-tive elec-tion process, he said: “I have not been hap-py with the process. I be-lieve it has been rife with bias and con-flict of in-ter-est, and that’s some-thing that I will say here and say any-where. I’ve writ-ten sev-er-al let-ters in re-sponse to what has been done.”
He said he has not seen any re-port aris-ing from the process but was in-formed it had been sent to the PNM Gen-er-al Coun-cil on Fri-day night to be ap-proved and act-ed up-on.
“Even though I’ve nev-er had an op-por-tu-ni-ty to see the re-port or even re-spond to it. How that is in the frame of nat-ur-al jus-tice, I have no idea,” he said.
“But there are per-sons in the par-ty who be-lieve that is the way busi-ness should be con-duct-ed. I as-sure them that is not the way it is go-ing to hap-pen.”
Asked whether he felt vic-timised with-in the par-ty, Man-ning said he did not.
“I feel like a per-son who stood up for his con-stituents. Some-one whom the con-stituents have placed their trust in.
“That’s part of the job. Whether I have to stand up against my own par-ty or some-one else to sup-port the con-stituents of San Fer-nan-do East, that’s what I signed up to do, and that’s what I will con-tin-ue to do.”
Man-ning al-so con-firmed he was mut-ed dur-ing the Gen-er-al Coun-cil’s on-line meet-ing on Fri-day, de-scrib-ing the in-ci-dent as un-for-tu-nate.
“As I said, I have not had any sight of the re-port. I have not had an op-por-tu-ni-ty to re-spond to the re-port. I tried to say that at the meet-ing, and there were oth-er mem-bers there who felt that I should not have been al-lowed a fo-rum to speak. That’s un-for-tu-nate.”
He said be-fore the meet-ing, he sub-mit-ted two let-ters on the mat-ter, nei-ther of which was read.
“I have no idea why. We have to de-cide ex-act-ly what needs to be done next be-cause I’ve sent let-ters and there has been no re-sponse. As I said, I have not seen any re-port.”
Man-ning said many par-ty groups were dis-sat-is-fied with the ver-i-fi-ca-tion process and were not giv-en suf-fi-cient time to pro-vide doc-u-men-ta-tion to val-i-date their sta-tus.
“Many of them were out of the coun-try and did not have enough time to sup-ply the in-for-ma-tion they felt was nec-es-sary to prove and val-i-date their ex-is-tence. So they felt that the val-i-da-tion process was, I don’t want to say a sham, but not one that would have pro-duced an ac-cu-rate re-sult.”
He al-so again dis-missed any sug-ges-tion he in-tend-ed to join the Unit-ed Na-tion-al Con-gress.
“That would cause my fa-ther to roll in his grave,” he said.