A bitter battle for the leadership of the Democratic Labour Party spilled onto the Voice of Barbados airwaves this morning with Verla Depeiza and her challenger Reverend Guy Hewitt trading allegations of dirty politics and hypocrisy.

Miss Depeiza, was a special guest on the Brass Tacks program to defend her leadership of the party after Reverend Hewitt had previously been on the call-in show to state his case for the presidency of the DLP.

The DLP leader responded to a previous charge by Reverend Hewitt that he was being unfairly treated in his bid to be a DLP candidate.

Miss Depeiza, alleges that Reverend Hewitt had his sights set on the St. John seat and seemed to want special treatment there and elsewhere.

But she insisted he would get none and the party’s selection process would be followed.

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Ms. Depeiza also accused both Reverend Hewitt and his supporters of dirty politics.

It’s a charge Reverend Hewitt denies.

Reverend Hewitt followed up his comments on Brass Tacks with a call to Starcom Network News in which he repeated his concerns about the fairness of the upcoming DLP Presidential elections.

Political pollster and analyst, Peter Wickham, meantime, describes the leadership battle as unfortunate and unseemly and says it’s not good for the party as it tries to rebuild after its devastating defeat at the last election.

But he thinks that based on the current evidence, the DLP still faces a difficult task against the BLP at the next poll regardless of which is the President.