Sunday could be a defining moment for the outcome of the next general election in Grenada, Carriacou & Petite Martinique.
The ruling National Democratic Congress (NDC) of Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell is planning to bring out 8,000 to 10,000 persons to its Mega Rally to be held at the Morne Rouge Playing field to mark its 4th anniversary in office.
If the party pulls this off with a massive showing, it will send a strong message to opponents especially the New National Party (NNP) now headed by former Education Minister Emmalin Pierre that surrendering power is not on the drawing board at this point in time.
The NDC is trying to replicate what the Maurice Bishop-led New Jewel Movement did on March 13, 1980 to mark the first anniversary of the Grenada Revolution following the overthrow one year earlier of the Grenada United Labour Party (GULP) government of Eric Gairy.
The NNP should be mindful of the fact that whenever Congress is in power and loses an election, a major contributing factor has been political infighting as seen in 1995 and 2013.
The electorate lost confidence in Congress back in 1995 partly due to the ill-advised decision of Dr. Francis Alexis (MP for St George South-east) to challenge George Brizan (MP for St George North-east) for the position of Political Leader following the decision of then Prime Minister Nicholas Brathwaite to bow out from frontline politics.
The NDC was again dogged by political infighting as forces loyal to Nazim Burke (Minister of Finance and Peter David (Minister of Tourism) battled to position themselves as successor to Prime Minister Tillman Thomas.
Dickon Mitchell is now the undisputed Leader of Congress with no one willing to commit political suicide by mounting a challenge to him in the scheme of things.
Unlike the 1995 and 2013 elections, Congress supporters are very much motivated and this is the state of affairs among its ranks at this point in time.
The opposite is now happening within NNP which has been affected since the 2022 poll with the departure of former Agriculture Minister Peter David to form the Democratic People’s Movement (DPM) which can create some problems especially in the rural areas.
Among the NNP candidates who can be impacted by the David-led political outfit is its leader Emmalin Pierre in St Andrew South-east and Kate Lewis in St Andrew North-east.
Like in 2022, the main player for Congress in going forward to the election will be Prime Minister Dickon Mitchell who helped several of the Candidates to win their seats in the last national poll.
The opposition has been trying to portray the NDC as weak locally especially in rural Grenada but there is no doubt that the Grenadian leader is far more popular than any of the other political leaders in the country in the Diaspora.
The NNP is making a major political blunder by not exposing its new leader Emmalin Pierre to Grenadians living in North America especially in the large community in New York.
The Diaspora is known to play a key role in getting family members back home to vote for a leader and party of their choice.
Keith Mitchell once ruled New York but Dickon Mitchell has now overtaken him in terms of popularity.
As the two major parties make their preparatory plans for the upcoming general election, the NNP is suffering from a financial problem among some of the candidates.
The party should not be in financial difficulties given the millions that entered its coffers over the years.
The candidates who lack finance should be calling on the former Political Leader Keith Mitchell to “free-up” some of the financial resources that came into the party’s coffers over the years.
THE NEW TODAY also sees Keith Mitchell as a big liability for NNP like Emmalin Pierre in seeking to unseat Dickon Mitchell from the Prime Ministership of the country.
Emmalin Pierre lacks national profile as well as the academic acumen that many Grenadians will look for to place an individual in the top leadership position in the country.
The Dwight Horsford/Dr. Myanna Charles combination is more of a better seller to the populace for NNP than the Emmalin Pierre/Norland Cox team.
The NNP has ended up in this sad state of affairs due to the constant scheming of Keith Mitchell to pave the way for him to remain in charge of running the affairs of the party.
Emmalin Pierre will continue to be affected and so the NNP chances at the polls by the role being played by her husband in the lead up to the upcoming general election.
Former Deputy Commissioner of Police Tafawa Pierre was never “a people’s person” during his years of service in the Royal Grenada Police Force (RGPF) and his frequent utterances in public are impacting negatively for his wife as the new political boss of NNP.
The NNP will most likely rise again whenever the period of transition takes place involving Keith Mitchell and Emmalin Pierre and “the right” Political Leader is found in the interest of our two-party democratic system of governance.