Senate Puts Wade Mark On Swine Flu Watch
The aggrieved politician said he got all clear from Ministry of Health. Senate President insists Mark needs another day before he can attend Parliament
The Government demonstrated the extent of its paranoia over the Swine Flu outbreak when it comically debarred an Opposition senator from participating in a sitting of the Senate yesterday.
Wade Mark, leader of Opposition business in the Senate, might blow a lot of hot air in the chamber every week but as far as President Danny Montano and even the Independent senators were concerned this time it could be deadly- at least, potentially bad enough to cause them to end up in a hospital isolation ward.
Mark was a passenger on that “dangerous “American Airlines Flight 1647 which brought two persons with the HINI virus to Trinidad on May 30.
Mark, one of 130 passengers who arrived on that flight, said he was given a clean bill of health, has been attending United National Congress/Alliance (UNC/A) political meetings and so on but was adjudged by a cautious Chief Medical Officer Dr Anton Cumberbatch to need another day to be free of the 10-day incubation period.
In other words, Mark would not only be spreading his usual wicked propaganda about the Government but could also be infecting people inside the sanctified chamber.
The irrepressible parliamentarian was not taking that treatment from the Senate.
Resplendent in customary Nehru suit, he complained to reporters outside that the Government was trying to silence him and deny him his rights.
He said he had sought guidance from the Ministry of Health and was assured by, one Dr Chinnia, that he was alright.
“He said Senator Mark you are in the clear the Ministry of Health has cleared you. So I was in shock when I came this morning and I was told by the marshall and a policeman that I cannot enter the Parliament.”
“The police want to arrest me for being in good health. Let them arrest me sir”, he told the Senate.
“And I came here in all honesty, sir not to spread no influenza. Not to spread any virus.”
He, dramatically, complained in a hurt tone: “I have evidence here from the World Health Organisation showing that it is a minimum of two and a maximum of seven. When I spoke to Dr Chinnia, he told me, Mr President, that it is seven days. You are in the clear. Go and do your work. Go and do your business. So I was a bit taken aback that my rights, my freedom, my liberty was being trampled upon this morning when I came here.”
An aggrieved Mark continued to make out his case and spent some 30 minutes in the Senate while the Independents mulled over whether they should stay in the chamber and risk being infected not by Mark’s bad politics but something deleterious to their health.
Montano wanted to know whether members would allow Mark to remain but the Opposition politician, having made his point, spared them the trouble of walking out and picking up his papers left.
The UNC/A leadership took a breather from its in-fighting to condemn “the unlawful employment of mischief and abuse of power” by the Senate President.
Only on Sunday Junior Minister Dr Amery Brown was claiming there was no panic among the Government about the swine flu virus.
In Tobago, it was reported that three women were being tested for the virus after complaining of flu-like symptoms. Two of the women had returned from the United States and one had attended the World Cup qualifying match in Bacolet on Saturday night.