Gail Alexan­der

House Speak­er Wade Mark yes­ter­day firm­ly re­fused to al­low for­mer prime min­is­ter Patrick Man­ning's re­peat­ed ap­peals to make a re­quest in Par­lia­ment fol­low­ing a state­ment by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar. In a tense stand-off be­tween the two, Mark threat­ened to ask Man­ning to leave the Par­lia­ment Cham­ber if he did not take his seat. The sit­u­a­tion oc­curred af­ter Per­sad-Bisses­sar had spo­ken about al­leged wire­tap­ping by the Spe­cial In­tel­li­gence Agency (SIA).

She al­lud­ed to Man­ning's state­ment of 2008 when he had claimed she was in touch with some­one from the In­tegri­ty Com­mis­sion.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar had al­so said the in­for­ma­tion on the SIA which she re­ceived two weeks ago sug­gest­ed sen­si­tive in­for­ma­tion, ob­tained via il­le­gal wire-tap­ping of Gov­ern­ment min­is­ters' phones, was be­ing sup­plied to a "cer­tain MP from the Op­po­si­tion bench... that MP now sits in this House and has served at the high­est lev­el in Gov­ern­ment un­der the pre­vi­ous ad­min­is­tra­tion."

Af­ter Per­sad-Bisses­sar's state­ment, Man­ning at­tempt­ed to rise to say some­thing. Mark in­struct­ed him to take his seat.

When Man­ning re­mained on his feet, Mark told him: "No, no, take your seat. There is no pro­ce­dure for any state­ment... please... please,,, please." Man­ning re­mained on his feet, ask­ing to be heard. Mark replied: "Could you take your seat ho­n­ourable mem­ber for San Fer­nan­do East?" Sound­ing slight­ly ex­as­per­at­ed, Mark con­tin­ued: "Please, you can­not speak. you can­not be on your feet when I'm on my feet. There is no pro­ce­dure... on the mat­ter... for a state­ment, like you re­spond­ed or any oth­er mem­ber re­spond­ed." Man­ning plead­ed he was not re­spond­ing.

Mark said: "So what are you stand­ing up for?"

Man­ning told Mark he was mak­ing a re­quest.

Mark said: "Could you sit?"

Man­ning re­peat­ed he was mak­ing a re­quest.

Mark shot back: "A re­quest for what?"

When Man­ning con­tin­ued ap­peal­ing, Mark said:

"No, no, no, no... lis­ten if you con­tin­ue to stand on your feet when I'm on my feet I'll ask you to leave the cham­ber. Ok... you take your seat... ok... let's con­tin­ue."

Man­ning, how­ev­er, re­mained on his feet and asked:

"Mr Speak­er, could I have your leave to make a re­quest of you?"

He re­peat­ed it: "Mr Speak­er, could I have your leave to make a re­quest of you?"

Mark an­swered: "No... no... de­nied."

Mark then or­dered that agen­da pro­ceed­ings con­tin­ue.