Former Grenada Foreign Affairs, Legal Affairs and Local Government Minister, Dr Raphael Fletcher has died after a prolonged illness. He was 86. Fletcher, a physicist and university lecturer, came to national attention when he resigned from the ruling New National Party (NNP) in 1998, accusing the then government of prime minister Dr Keith Mitchell of being corrupt. Fletcher joined the Grenada United Labour Party (GULP) to contest the 1999 general election that Mitchell called more than a year ahead of the constitutional deadline. The NNP won all 15 seats in the elections, a feat it repeated in the 2013 poll. Fletcher entered politics in 1980 when he formed the Grenada People’s Movement. His last public political appearance was during the 2008 general elections when he campaigned on the platform of the NNP. Fletcher will be buried on Friday following a tribute and funeral service at the St George’s Cathedral of Immaculate Conception. As a former parliamentarian, Fletcher will be afforded an official state funeral. Source: ja observer