Decision had already been made – Eustace

When in 2000, Sir James Mitchell shortened the life of Parliament, Arnhim Eustace, the man he handpicked to take over leadership of the party was in agreement with the decision to call fresh elections.{{more}}

“I called Arnhim while in Grenada and he agreed with me to shorten the life of Parliament, but he has never made a public statement about that,” Sir James said.

Eustace, however, told SEARCHILGHT on Wednesday that when he was contacted by Mitchell, the decision had already been made.

“The decision had been made when he called; it was not a question of it being discussed – the decision had already been made,” the Leader of the Opposition told SEARCHLIGHT.

After months of unrest in St Vincent, Mitchell was in Grenada to broker an agreement with the Organization in Defence of Democracy and Opposition Leader Dr Ralph Gonsalves.

Mitchell strongly refutes the claim that he made Dr Ralph Gonsalves prime minister in his new publication “St Vincent and the Grenadines The Ungovernable,” which was released this week.

“They say that I made Ralph prime Minister…the only person I made prime minister was Arnhim Eustace and he made himself Leader of the Opposition three times,” Mitchell said.

“Finally, I trust that these reflections destroy the myth that I gave Ralph Gonsalves the job of prime minister. A lot of persons still want to ignore the fact that it was the people in a democratic election who put Gonsalves in power,” the man, who served as prime minister for 16 consecutive years, continued.

Mitchell explained that he was in favour of making Eustace the new leader of the New Democratic Party, but he had to first find him a constituency.

And this he did in East Kingstown, by moving the incumbent Carlyle Dougan and offering him and his wife a position in either Washington, New York or London; Dougan eventually opted to serve as the High Commissioner in London, Mitchell said.

Mitchell said work had to be done with the constituency division, as Eustace did not know any of the people and Eustace then became the constituency representative for East Kingstown, with Godwin Friday being that for the Northern Grenadines and Terrence Ollivierre the Southern Grenadines. (DD)