Diane Henry wants an apology from Prime Minister Patrick Manning for a comment he made on Sunday in an address at a convention of the People's National Movement (PNM). Henry is the mother of ten-year-old Tecia Henry who was found murdered last week in Laventille. Unlike cabinet minister Dr Amery Browne who visited Henry to offer condolences and offer help from social services, Manning had not commented on the brutal murder of the little girl.
On Sunday he told members of his party that they should not take Tecia's murder at "face value", an insinuation that it was not what it seems. He said, “There is more to it than that, but I am not at liberty to say.”
There have been rumours in the community that the murder was drug related and that the child's mother was part of the drug trade. Manning didn't go further but Henry is furious.
Read the story: Autopsy shows 10-year-old stranged
She has denied that her child’s murder was drug related. And she is putting Manning in his place. “Manning needs to apologise and he needs to apologise to the John John people,” Henry told the Trinidad Guardian. She insisted Tecia was killed because of “envy...Is just natural envy and jealousy. That is why they take my child life. I is a single parent,” she said.
Tecia disappeared on June 13. Her mother had sent her on an errand and she never returned. A few days later her body was found in a shallow grave near her home.
This is not the first time Manning has made such comments. He has previously suggested that some kidnappings are bogus or staged and he is on record as saying he knows who is behind organized crime in the country. "I know Mr Big," he has been quoted as saying.
Manning has also been roundly criticized for meeting with gang leaders, whom he called 'community leaders' and arranging for them to get government contracts.
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