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TUESDAY, APRIL 2, 2019
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Lucayan buyers must be Freeport’s Atlantis By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net
T
HE Grand Lucayan’s new owners must have an Atlantistype impact to relaunch a destination that will have been “off the market” for at least four years, a Freeport hotelier warned yesterday. Magnus Alnebeck, Pelican Bay’s general manager, told Tribune Business that the ITM/Royal Caribbean joint venture needed to have the kind of effect on Freeport that Sir Sol Kerzner achieved in the mid-1990s with Paradise Island’s rebirth if the city is to re-establish itself in the global tourism marketplace. Pointing to a littlenoticed aspect of their deal, Mr Alnebeck said October 2019 will mark the third anniversary of the Grand Lucayan’s post-Hurricane Matthew closure and the loss of some 1,000 hotel rooms and 500-1,000 jobs. The government has indicated that it will likely take between four to six months to close the Grand Lucayan’s $65m sale, and a Heads of Agreement, with the ITM/Royal Caribbean
• Must do what Kerzner did for Nassau/PI • Hotelier: City likely ‘off market’ for 4 years • People ‘dreaming’ about quick fixes
THE GRAND LUCAYAN RESORT consortium which potentially pushes the likely completion date out until end-2019. The Mexican port developer and cruise line have said the $130m first phase investment will cover a 24-month period, meaning that a revived Grand Lucayan - complete with water-based theme park and associated retail, gaming and restaurant amenities - may only be ready to receive its first guests come winter 2021. That would create a nearfive year interval between the closure of two of the
Grand Lucayan’s current three properties, and Freeport’s effective disappearance from the mass market tourism map, and its return - a huge gap that will have to be bridged. Mr Alnebeck, who estimated it may take a year from the deal’s closing to restart substantial operations, said many persons were “dreaming about quick things” happening in the letter of intent’s (LOI) aftermath when clearly that will not be the case. He added that ITM/ Royal Caribbean will face “a similar thing” to that
Water Corp unions plan ‘wildcat’ action By NATARIO MCKENZIE
Tribune Business Reporter
nmckenzie@tribunemedia.net THE Water & Sewerage Corporation’s (WSC) two trade unions are planning to stage a “wildcat withdrawal of enthusiasm” today amid claims staff morale is at an “all-time low”. Dwayne Woods, the Bahamas Utilities Service and Allied Workers Union (BUSAWU) president, said itself and the management union plan to co-operate with joint action as he revealed his members had also expressed fears that their workplace conversations were being “bugged” and recorded. Such allegations were last week denied by Adrian Gibson, the Water & Sewerage Corporation’s executive chairman, when they were made by middle management union members, and the state-owned utility’s executives yesterday
encountered by Sir Sol and Kerzner International when they relaunched the Nassau/ Paradise Island tourism product with Atlantis in the mid-1990s. “It’s kind of critical that when they come in they understand they have to be the catalyst for getting new people to the island,” Mr Alnebeck told Tribune Business of the Grand Lucayan’s prospective purchasers. “It’s a total repositioning, relaunching of the destination. In November, it’s going to be three years since close to 80 percent of the hotel rooms were closed, and that’s a long time to be away from the market. “Once they have their plans, I doubt we’re going to see any new product, and new rooms, for at least a year. A lot of people are dreaming about quick things, driving down the Lucayan Strip one morning and seeing a sign that says:
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‘Irreparable harm’: Local broker’s fear dismissed by SEC By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net US FEDERAL regulators have dismissed fears that a Bahamian broker/ dealer will suffer “irreparable harm” as a result of its probe, accusing its principal of “forum shopping” to defeat their efforts. The Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC), in legal arguments against Guy Gentile’s bid for a temporary injunction to halt its investigation, said the subpoenas it was issuing to his company’s banks and clearing houses did not come close to the standard required for the New Jersey federal court to impose the remedy he was seeking. The US capital markets regulator also alleged that the head of MintBroker International, the former Bay Street-based Swiss America Securities, was engaged in “forum shopping” by initiating legal action in New Jersey when the actual investigation and hearings on subpoenas it wants to issue to his associates - are taking place in the South Florida courts. However, attorneys for one of Mr Gentile’s USbased legal representatives, who is the subject of one
DWAYNE WOODS pledged they would not be distracted by Mr Woods’ “frivolous and attention-seeking efforts” and claimed he was
undertaking “a vendetta”. But, undaunted, Mr Woods yesterday promised: “Tomorrow [today], both unions will be outside. We will have a joint press conference and we will be wildcat-ing tomorrow. We’re going to be addressing a multiplicity of concerns. We’d like to call it a withdrawal of enthusiasm. Worker morale is at an all-time low right now. We will demonstrate that on Tuesday.”
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such subpoena, recently argued before the south Florida court that it was the SEC which was guilty of “forum shopping” given that all its previous legal actions against the MintBroker chief were heard in New Jersey. Mr Gentile defeated those actions on legal technicalities, and continued to brand the SEC’s continuing probe of himself and his Bahamian broker/dealer as a witchhunt and “vendetta” after he refused to stop working and co-operating with it as an undercover informant. He, and the attorneys for his US legal representative, are arguing that the SEC is using an investigation that initially never involved him or MintBroker/Swiss America as an “open ended” tool to get him. However, the SEC is arguing that there is no connection between the now-closed New Jersey cases and South Florida probe, and that it has every right and obligation to investigate where it suspects US securities laws have been breached. The crux of its latest case is that Mr Gentile and MintBroker violated
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WTO ‘no silver bullet’ for GDP growth woes By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net
OUTSIDE of the Water & Sewerage headquarters.
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FULL World Trade Organisation (WTO) membership “is not a silver bullet” for solving The Bahamas’ economic growth woes, a Chamber of Commerce executive argued yesterday. Darron Pickstock, who heads the chamber’s trade and investment division, told Tribune Business this nation needed to “take a broader approach beyond WTO” to addressing its inadequate GDP growth rate and getting the economy “back on track”. Arguing that the Bahamian economy is “simply not growing” fast enough to
DARRON PICKSTOCK generate the quantity, and quality, of jobs required, Mr Pickstock said this nation needed to determine “how we get to the next level” regardless of whether it became a full WTO member or not. The Glinton, Sweeting & O’Brien attorney, who will be attending this week’s fourth Working Party
meeting on The Bahamas’ accession bid as the chamber’s representative, reaffirmed that the private sector body was presently maintaining its “neutral” stance on whether becoming a full WTO member is the right approach for the country. He added that the imminent completion, and release, of the study it commissioned from Oxford Economics on WTO membership’s likely impact on the economy and specific industries will “cement” the chamber’s position on whether it comes out in favour of - or against - the move. Mr Pickstock, though,
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WTO to ‘modernise 70-year-old model’ By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor nhartnell@tribunemedia.net THE government is “absolutely correct to modernise a 70-year-old economic model” by seeking full WTO membership, a well-known Bahamian attorney argued yesterday. Carey Leonard, a former Grand Bahama Port Authority (GBPA) inhouse counsel, told Tribune Business that Bahamian companies needed to prepare themselves to exploit its potential benefits rather than “moaning that the world is changing”. He urged Bahamians to follow Fiji’s example, as set by its Fiji Water brand, and seek to export their products to the world, adding: “If Fiji can do it, we can do it.” Besides securing overseas market access for
• Attorney: ‘If Fiji can do it, so can we’ • Govt ‘absolutely correct’ to succeed • ORG chief warns in producer ‘danger’
CAREY LEONARD
ROBERT MYERS
Bahamian exports, Mr Leonard said joining the World Trade Organisation (WTO) as a full member would also boost foreign direct investment (FDI) through the “absolute certainty” it will provide over the rules governing its presence and protection for its
products/capital. Making the case that this would also enhance The Bahamas’ economic competitiveness, Mr Leonard said Bahamians needed to look beyond the present economic reality with “out of the box thinking” to envision future possibilities
in the WTO’s rules-based trading environment. The Bahamas will this week stage its fourth meeting with the Working Party overseeing the longest-ever WTO accession process, standing at 18 years and counting, and Mr Leonard agreed with former Chamber of Commerce president, Edison Sumner, that the debate on whether this nation should join is effectively over. “Without a doubt they’re right and absolutely correct,” Mr Leonard told Tribune Business of the government’s decision to finally complete the WTO
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