Last Sunday was a most defining moment in the life of Peter David as a political figure in Grenada.
The onslaught on him by former Prime Minister Dr. Keith Mitchell at a General Council session of the New National Party (NNP) was so brutal, vicious and nasty that David will have to stop and take stock of his future in the political organisation.
THE NEW TODAY holds the view that the choices are clear for the former 1979-83 Grenada Revolutionary figure – withdraw from the NNP or face expulsion from the party.
The latter is very much on the cards as Keith Mitchell has just reconstituted a Disciplinary Committee for the party to deal with persons deemed as recalcitrant.
The attack on Peter David is also a crippling blow to the remnants of the Grenada Left who saw him as their last great hope to capture one of the major political parties on the island to be used as a springboard for them to once again regain State power.
The so-called Grenada Left who is linked to the disgraced former Deputy Prime Minister Bernard Coard believed that despite the collapse of the Grenada Revolution, communism will go back on the drawing board, engage in some kind of reformation and come back again to take control of the island.
The Keith Mitchell tirade on Sunday has not just put to rest but buried those expectations and aspirations of David and his small band of followers.
The readers of history will realise that it was another major blunder in tactics by Peter David in the manner in which he sought to rise to the top of NNP to become its Political Leader.
The Bernard Coard clique known as OREL in Bishop’s New Jewel Movement (NJM) would have learnt the hard and bitter lesson that once the Prime Minister was executed on October 19, 1983 it marked the death of the Grenada Revolution.
Peter David was associated with that faction of the revolution and repeated the same mistake in the 2008-13 period of Congress rule under Prime Minister Tillman Thomas.
He was the ringleader of a dissident wing in the party that had to be expelled in their attempts to wrestle for control of the party and government from the man called “Uncle Tilly” who was loved and greatly respected by members and supporters of Congress.
The Peter David bandwagon hitched a ride with Keith Mitchell and NNP for the 2013 general election and had great expectations that their leader would eventually rise to the top of the party.
He used the same political playbook in the battle with PM Thomas in an attempt to seize control of NNP from Keith Mitchell and his second in command Gregory Bowen who is more of a hardliner than his boss.
This so-called revolutionary figure did not learn from the mistakes made in 1983 and 2012 in the events involving Bishop and Tillman Thomas.
His strategy was the same – engage in some kind of a battle with Keith Mitchell to take control of the party.
Anyone who emerges as the new Political Leader of NNP has to be endorsed by Mitchell and Bowen – the two most powerful figures and major decision makers in the party.
Peter David has no control over NNP as Mitchell is still the major financier of the party and still raises the funds for the operations of the head office of the party, as well as other functions including political meetings.
Keith Mitchell is totally in charge of his party despite the fact that he is going down in age and is no longer “blessed” with the energy and vigour to engage in daily ventures up and down the country to convince people to vote him back into power.
It was his handpicked delegates who showed up Sunday at the General Council at the Trade Centre to hear their leader tear into and destroy the ambitions of Peter David and his followers.
It will be more or less the same when the NNP holds its Convention, most likely in December, to vote for the new party leader with the specially selected delegates to vote for the Slate of Candidates put forward by Keith Mitchell and Gregory Bowen.
It is just the NNP way of doing business under their current leader.
As the NNP boss told his people on Sunday, the person who takes over from him will be “a child of the house who can represent what is a true NNP… they know no other way than the NNP way.”
Peter David would have been in a better position in the scheme of things if he had not deceived Glynis Roberts and her small National United Front (NUF) on becoming its political leader but instead worked out a deal with Mitchell to be a part of his group for and after the 2013 general election.
There are people who hold the view that in a democracy, Peter David had every right to challenge for the leadership of the party but he knew all along and even before joining the political organisation that NNP is nothing but the Keith Mitchell and Gregory Bowen show.
Some call it Karma and the day of reckoning for Peter David but THE NEW TODAY chooses to describe the current unfolding situation as “the end of rank political opportunism” by the so-called “blue eyed boy” of the leftist remnants in the country.
The political death of Peter David is nigh.