This time next week, I’ll be in the midst of the bacchanal that is Jouvay. Jouvay is truth in a way that nothing else can be.
So as I get my heart and mind ready for this week, I’m reflecting on my Jouvay truths. My love for Trinidad and Carnival and art.

Today is the 30th Anniversary of Grenadian Prime Minister Maurice Bishop being placed under house arrest.

On October 14th 1983, the Bernard Coard led faction of the New Jewel Movement placed Prime Minister Maurice Bishop under house arrest because he had refused their calls for joint leadership of the NJM.

In an Extraordinary Meeting of the Central Committee of September 16 a joint leadership between Bishop and Deputy Prime Minister Bernard Coard was first formally proposed.

Central Committee member Liam James proposed Coard a joint leader, saying that Bishop lacked ‘a Leninist level of organisation and discipline.. ideological clarity.. [and] brilliance in strategy and tactics’.  

On September 25th, 1983 the faction further advanced the idea of the NJM being transformed into a formal Marxist-Leninist Party.

Word of Bishop’s arrest caused massive protests.

What unfolded in the following days was a horror that we are still coming to terms with.

 

Look out for more posts this week on Grenada and the Revolution.