In their first post-invasion ballot, voters pick a moderate
For Grenada, election day 1984 dawned as a tropical idyl: clear skies and sunshine, with brief spells of rain to break the sultry Caribbean heat. The splendid morning weather helped make a large turnout seem as inevitable as the arrival of the winter cruise ships in St. George's, the capital. At churches, schools and even discotheques, 85% of the island's 48,000 voters lined up for their first free elections since 1976. The balloting was described by an observer from the Organization of American States as "flawless." So, from the point of view of the Reagan Administration, was the outcome. Thirteen months after the U.S. invasion of their island, Grenadians decisively rejected the kind of political radicalism that prompted that intervention, and instead gave a resounding mandate for moderation.
The landslide winner, with 59% of the vote, was the centrist New National Party, led by Herbert Blaize, 66, a cautiously conservative former head of government whose political career on the island stretches back for decades. The N.N.P. won 14 of the 15 seats in Grenada's new House of Representatives. A day later, Blaize, who sported a new gray fedora on the way to the ceremony, was sworn in as Prime Minister at York House, Grenada's yellow brick, Georgian-style government building. He then thanked voters for "showing in such a massive way that they are willing to take command of their own affairs."
The big loser, with 36% of the ballot, was the Grenada United Labor Party, led by Sir Eric Gairy, 62, the country's first Prime Minister after independence in 1974 and an eccentric, authoritarian figure whose unsavory political history made his possible comeback a cause of much concern in Washington. G.U.L.P. won the remaining parliamentary seat, but then rejected it, alleging electoral fraud. Gairy offered a novel theory to buttress his charges of cheating. According to him, the ballots had been treated with a special chemical that was able to change votes to favor the winners. "Science and technology today is so high that I have no reason to doubt this," said Gairy, who once urged the United Nations to investigate unidentified flying objects.
Almost completely ignored by voters was the Maurice Bishop Patriotic Movement, the remnant of the revolutionary New Jewel Movement, which seized power from Gairy in 1979. The M.B.P.M., headed by former Industrial Development Minister Kendrick Radix, was named after Maurice Bishop, the charismatic New Jewel founder who was assassinated by a hard-line faction of his leftist party six days before U.S. troops arrived on Grenada. The trial of 19 former New Jewel members for the murder of Bishop, 39, and ten of his followers was stalled last week by procedural wrangling.