GAIL ALEXAN­DER

Se­nior Po­lit­i­cal Re­porter

San Fer­nan­do East MP Bri­an Man­ning has apol­o­gised and dis­tanced him­self from cer­tain re­spons­es that ap­peared on his Face­book page re­gard­ing re­cent is­sues that have been sim­mer­ing with­in the PNM.

In a Face­book post yes­ter­day, Man­ning said: “It has been brought to my at­ten­tion that some­one with ac­cess to the MP’s page has been re­spond­ing to com­ments, in an at­tempt to de­fend my name.

“While I ap­pre­ci­ate the strong sen­ti­ments that re­cent is­sues have raised, I in no way con­done any of the re­spons­es that were post­ed on­line. This was a lapse in judge­ment by the re­spon­si­ble par­ties, and I sin­cere­ly apol­o­gise to the par­ties af­fect­ed. Re­cent is­sues should con­tin­ue to stim­u­late re­spect­ful de­bate, not tear down any­one.”

Man­ning said the San Fer­nan­do East is­sues, which have caused some “heat” with­in the PNM, are be­ing dealt with in­ter­nal­ly.

His apol­o­gy arose af­ter de­vel­op­ment diplo­mat and strate­gic con­sul­tant Pearce Robin­son took is­sue with Man­ning’s ex­change with a per­son and asked him to tone it down.

Robin­son said while he sup­port­ed Man­ning stand­ing up for what he be­lieved in, he should do so in keep­ing with the stan­dard of con­duct ex­pect­ed from some­one in pub­lic life.

Fol­low­ing Man­ning’s apol­o­gy, Robin­son said: “An apol­o­gy los­es much of its mean­ing when cou­pled with an at­tempt to shift re­spon­si­bil­i­ty to un­named peo­ple sup­pos­ed­ly op­er­at­ing your page.

“The orig­i­nal is­sue was sim­ple: in­ap­pro­pri­ate per­son­al re­marks were made. The prop­er re­sponse was equal­ly sim­ple: ac­knowl­edge it, apol­o­gise, cor­rect course and move on. This ex­pla­na­tion now cre­ates a cred­i­bil­i­ty prob­lem that did not need to ex­ist.”