Parliament has chosen not to respond to the “damaging statements” surrounding the suicide of parliamentary manager Lennox Garane and his note saying it was a protest against 20 months of bullying.

“Parliament would prefer not to respond to damaging statements made following the funeral service held over the weekend in Mount Ayliff in the Eastern Cape‚” it said on Tuesday.

Garane‚ 57‚ shot himself in his office September 14. He was a section manager in the international relations and protocol division.

His note was handed to mourners at a memorial service. Headed “It’s A Protest Suicide”‚ it described how his life became a misery after a former ANC MP was appointed as his manager.

Garane said he had submitted a grievance‚ but the man to whom the “unrepentant bully” reported had refused to consider it. He said parliament was “a political environment‚ which I interpreted as meaning political appointees ... were free to do as they wished with lives of those below them”.