Shepherd acting general secretary while top brass investigates

The general secretary of the Democratic Labour Party, Steve Blackett, has been suspended, party officials confirmed late on Thursday.

The party’s top brass is to conduct an investigation, Barbados TODAY was told but no further details of the nature of the probe were forthcoming as the rift at the top of the opposition party took another twist. 

The surprise decision was taken at an intense closed-door meeting of the party’s general council at party headquarters on George Street.

Pedro Shepherd, the assistant general secretary who will replace Blackett in the post for the time being, disclosed the outcome of the meeting.

“The general council of the Democratic Labour Party at its general council meeting held at its headquarters… unanimously moved and adopted a motion to refer complaints regarding the general secretary Mr Steve Blackett to the disciplinary committee of the party. Mr Blackett has been suspended from his office of general secretary pending the conclusion of an investigation.

“So that’s basically where we are at this point,” he told Barbados TODAY, declining to answer any further questions.

Blackett was the subject of a no-confidence motion filed by veteran party member Hartley Reid, who had also called for the removal of the president, Dr Ronnie Yearwood, and the executive council. But the no-confidence motion was deemed flawed at a meeting of the party’s executive council on April 11. Blackett had told journalists at a news conference that further investigations would be conducted by the party’s other organs.

Then, on April 21, at a members’ forum, Blackett announced that he had filed two resolutions. One called for the expulsion of political leader Ralph Thorne, who was admitted to the party in February after severing ties with the ruling Barbados Labour Party administration and becoming the opposition leader in the House of Assembly. The other resolution urged the DLP to fully back Dr Yearwood to lead the party into the next general election.

At the centre of the no-confidence motion against Blackett was an invitation extended by Saint Lucia’s opposition United Workers Party to both the party leader and Thorne as the DLP’s political leader to be guests at the UWP’s 60th anniversary celebrations in Castries. 

Reid’s motion claimed that Thorne never received the invitation while Dr Yearwood led a delegation to the event. But Blackett confirmed the DLP received invitations extended to both Dr Yearwood and Thorne and insisted that Thorne’s “was dispatched immediately to him”. (SD)