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Saturday, July 12, 2025

Manning back in House tomorrow

by

20140108

Al­most two years af­ter San Fer­nan­do East MP Patrick Man­ning suf­fered a mild stroke, he is ex­pect­ed to re­turn to Par­lia­ment to­mor­row for its first sit­ting in the new year. He has been on ex­tend­ed sick leave for al­most two years of the cur­rent ses­sion. He fell ill at his con­stituen­cy of­fice on Cof­fee Street, San Fer­nan­do, on Jan­u­ary 23, 2012 and lat­er in the night he suf­fered the stroke. He was tak­en to San Fer­nan­do Gen­er­al Hos­pi­tal and days lat­er he went to Wash­ing­ton, DC, for fur­ther treat­ment, in­clud­ing phys­io­ther­a­py.

He re­turned home in Au­gust but days lat­er he suf­fered a seizure and was hos­pi­talised again at San Fer­nan­do for two days. On April 10, 2013 ru­mours cir­cu­lat­ed that Man­ning had died. Af­ter deny­ing the claim, Man­ning made a high-pro­file trip to Port-of-Spain to buy a shirt to at­tend a church ser­vice. He con­tin­ued his phys­io­ther­a­py at the Au­gus­tus Long Hos­pi­tal, Pointe-a-Pierre, for sev­er­al months. He re­quest­ed ex­tend­ed sick leave, which was grant­ed by Speak­er Wade Mark.

The work at his con­stituen­cy of­fice was han­dled by staff and he vis­it­ed on cer­tain days to meet with con­stituents. Yes­ter­day Man­ning used so­cial me­dia to in­form the pub­lic of his re­turn to Par­lia­ment to­mor­row. "Back to work. See you in Par­lia­ment on Fri­day," he post­ed on Face­book and Twit­ter.

Man­ning was said to have im­proved sig­nif­i­cant­ly in the past few months and to­mor­row af­ter­noon was ex­pect­ed to oc­cu­py a new seat in Par­lia­ment, be­hind Op­po­si­tion Whip Mar­lene Mc Don­ald. He pre­vi­ous­ly sat in the last seat on the 12-seat Op­po­si­tion front bench. For­mer Op­po­si­tion Sen­a­tor Ter­rence Deyals­ingh was elect­ed the 13th PNM MP in Par­lia­ment on No­vem­ber 4, hav­ing won the St Joseph by-elec­tion. Man­ning said he would quit pol­i­tics at the end of next year's cur­rent term.

Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar and Op­po­si­tion Leader Dr Kei­th Row­ley have re­peat­ed­ly wished Man­ning a speedy re­cov­ery and re­turn to Par­lia­ment. Leader of Gov­ern­ment Busi­ness in the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives, Hous­ing Min­is­ter Dr Roodal Mono­mi­al, said he would be hap­py to re­ceive his own MP to the House af­ter a long stay away due to ill­ness. In a two line e-mail com­ment, Mooni­lal said he was "look­ing for­ward to his usu­al in­ci­sive con­tri­bu­tions af­ter such a vac­u­ous and unin­spired pe­ri­od un­der Dr Row­ley."


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