A former senior minister in a previous government of the New National Party (NNP) has blasted its longest serving political leader Keith Mitchell over his despicable behaviour at the party’s General Council session last Sunday and called for him to take a back seat and allow the party to reorganise itself without him.

Speaking to THE NEW TODAY on Wednesday, the ex-government minister said that the 79-year old Mitchell had desecrated the party with his antics at the General Council which should be focused on looking at ways to strengthen the party with the upcoming general election in mind.

He chided the former Grenadian leader for “his lowdown commonness and vulgarity and disrespect for the General Council and the supporters” in the manner in which he addressed the “girlfriend” issue arising from his romantic relationship with Ophelia Wells, the former Acting Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Finance.

The “Ophelia Wells” issue is now a subject of national attention after she retained an attorney-at-law to threaten THE NEW TODAY with a lawsuit after it reported on her “concubinage” relationship with Mitchell.

Ophelia became “the female partner of the then Prime Minister while married to Dennis Cornwall, the current Minister of Finance while Keith Mitchell was still legally married to the Barbadian-born Marietta Mitchell.

According to the ex-government minister, the NNP General Council “is really a stock-taking meeting where the party comes together to take stock of its present circumstances” at all levels of the party including its membership, political situation in order “to regulate a way forward.”

“Tell that guy (Keith Mitchell) the quicker NNP get him out of the party will be better for them,” he quipped.“The quicker they transition him out … is better for the party. He is too vulgar and out of order,” he said.

The ex-government minister stated that this important NNP gathering should really be aimed at discussing the current issues in the country and correcting the shortcoming of the party. He said that instead of focusing on the way forward for the NNP, the former Prime Minister chose “to come there with this vulgarity.”

“He has actually destroyed the purpose of the General Council. This is not a meeting for piccong, this is not a political platform meeting and the guy cannot come there with his vulgarity and stupidity and talking about his woman and girlfriend. What does girlfriend has to do with a General Council meeting? What love has to do with it?

The high-ranking NNP official who is no longer actively involved in frontline politics felt that Keith Mitchell should be brought to “shame” for the “vulgarity and slackness that he wants to introduce to the party.”

He said the NNP is currently under a reconstruction phase following its loss at the polls in the 2022 general elections to Congress and has been able to attract a lot of young people in the past two years. “It’s an upcoming party, full of young people with different views and prospect. This derelict politics is over,” he remarked.

The ex-government minister sees a good future ahead for the NNP as it has been able to attract a number of young people who want “to chart a new path.” “This common, derelict party of concubism is over,” he added. This is an apparent reference to the number of personal relationships involving male and female NNP Cabinet ministers over the years.

According to the ex-government minister, it appears to him that Mitchell will be difficult to dislodge as he is the one with “the purse” in hand to run the affairs of the party. “The problem is that he (Mitchell) still has the purse,” he said.

Speculation is rife that the new NNP political boss, former Education Minister Emmalin Pierre has to rely heavily on the finances of Mitchell for the operations of the party. The ex-NNP government minister believes it is about time for the nation to start putting back what he called “some kind of credence in politics in Grenada”.

“This thing cannot be about joy-riding, living good, having fun, eating and drinking and traveling at the expense of people and nothing is being produced. That is what politics has come to in Grenada now,” he remarked.

The former NNP minister likened Keith Mitchell to having a similar outlook in politics to current U.S President Donald Trump. The former Grenada Prime Minister is known to have been a registered Republican like Trump.