The Grenada 17 – A review

29.JUN.07

On March 13, 1979, the New Jewel Movement (NJM), a leftist political party, overthrew the Grenada United Labour Party government led by Eric Gairy. The NJM, led by Maurice Bishop, forcibly removed the Gairy government from power whilst Gairy was visiting the USA.

The resulting NJM government, which included non-members of the NJM, became known as the Peoples’ Revolutionary Government (PRG) and their policies and programmes became known as the Grenada Revolution.{{more}}

While Bishop did not set up a democracy, he worked to satisfy citizens with a host of national improvements. Among Bishop’s accomplishments were free education and healthcare, better public transportation and banks, and 45 miles of new roads. Milk was freely distributed and a new eye hospital, a new maternity clinic, and new dental clinics were built. He instituted a successful literacy campaign, a teacher-training program, free secondary education, and enhanced higher education and scholarship programs.

Under Bishop’s rule, the island’s economic infrastructure was bolstered. Fish-selling centres were updated, feeder roads were built to aid small farmers in getting to market.

Plans were in the works to accommodate and revive the tourist industry, and an International Airport was under construction. Many of the improvements instituted by Bishop were funded by Cuban and other Soviet bloc aid, which made him a target of suspicion among non-Communist governments, mainly the United States.

Divisions appeared to exist among the members of the NJM leadership. The divisions were focused mainly on two key leaders of the NJM: Prime Minister Maurice Bishop and Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Bernard Coard. While Bishop enjoyed broad popular support among the Grenadian population, Coard enjoyed the support of a majority of the NJM Central Committee.

Reports of friction between the two were common. When Bishop accepted a $14.1 million loan from the International Monetary Fund, some conservative factions suspected that Bishop had agreed to shift his socialist tendencies in order to secure the money.

On the evening of October 13, 1983 the People’s Revolutionary Army in conjunction with the Coard faction placed Prime Minister Bishop and several of his supporters under house arrest.

Prime Minister Maurice Bishop, backed by other NJM leaders resisted the Coard faction. On October 19 there was a popular uprising in support of Bishop, seeking to restore him to power. Crowds estimated at between 15,000 to 30,000 persons shut down workplaces, poured into the streets of the capital, St. George’s, and freed Bishop from house arrest. Bishop and his followers immediately went to Fort Rupert in order to regroup and gauge the situation.

Meanwhile, Bernard Coard

and the nine members of the Central Committee who supported him, along with factions of the military, had grouped at Fort Frederick. These troops, under the leadership of a 25-year-old officer, then travelled the short distance to Fort Rupert. Upon their arrival, gunfire broke out between the troops and those at Fort Rupert, killing and wounding somewhere between 60 and 150 men, women and children.

Prime Minister Bishop ordered one of his supporters to immediately negotiate a surrender in order to prevent any further bloodshed. Military forces loyal to Coard captured Fort Rupert. Bishop, Fitzroy Bain (President of the Agricultural and General Workers Union), Minister of Housing Norris Bain, Minister of Education and Women’s Affairs Jacqueline Creft, Vincent Noel, Foreign Minister Unison Whiteman, Evelyn Bullen (businesswoman), and Keith Hayling (member of the Marketing & Import Board) were singled out, detained and summarily executed in the Fort’s courtyard.

Six days later, with the support of Caribbean governments, the United States of America (USA) led an invasion of Grenada which removed Coard and his faction from power.

In 1986, fourteen former members of the Government of Grenada and three soldiers were convicted of the execution style murders. They were: Bernard Coard, Selwyn Strachan, General Hudson Austin, Ewart Layne, Liam James, Leon Cornwall, Dave Bartholomew, John Ventour, Phyllis Coard, Colville McBarnette, Christopher Stroude, Lester Redhead, Calistus Bernard, Cecil Prime, Andy Mitchell, Vincent Joseph and Cosmos Richardson.

Phyllis Coard, the lone woman of the Grenada 17, was released from Richmond Hill Prison on Saturday, March 18, 2000. Mrs Coard was released to seek treatment for colon cancer.

On December 2, 2006 three others were freed: Former soldiers Cosmos Richardson, Andy Mitchell and Vincent Joseph, who had served twenty years of thirty-year sentences.

On Wednesday, June 27, 2007 Justice Francis Belle of Barbados, ordered the immediate release of Christopher Stroude, Lester Redhead and Cecil Prime.

During the re-sentencing trial, the prosecution had indicated that there had been little evidence against Prime, Stroud, and Redhead to identify them as part of the 1983 executions. While three of the 13 have been released, the others have been resentenced for up to 40 years in prison – 35 years of which most of them have already served.

Two others will have a review on health grounds in the next few months.