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A dou­ble de­feat in the Sen­ate yes­ter­day as Sen­ate Pres­i­dent Wade Mark shut down both at­tempts by the Op­po­si­tion and In­de­pen­dent bench­es to probe ac­cu­sa­tions made by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar.

The re­quest to file the mo­tions was sparked by alarm­ing com­ments made by Per­sad-Bisses­sar via her so­cial me­dia ac­count on Jan­u­ary 28, where she ac­cused two in­de­pen­dent sen­a­tors of want­i­ng to trade votes for per­son­al favours with re­gard to the Law Re­form (Zones of Spe­cial Op­er­a­tions) (Spe­cial Se­cu­ri­ty and Com­mu­ni­ty De­vel­op­ment Mea­sures) Bill 2026. The bill, which was passed in the Low­er House, was heav­i­ly de­feat­ed in the Up­per House.

Both Sen­a­tors filed mo­tions of priv­i­lege re­gard­ing im­prop­er con­duct.