By NEIL HARTNELL
Tribune Business Editor
nhartnell@tribunemedia.net
A former Hotel Corporation chairman has accused Branville McCartney of “talking poppycock” over his fears that the Bahamian people might lose 1,000 acres due to the Baha Mar debacle.
George Smith told Tribune Business that the Government had conveyed just 40 per cent of that acreage amount to the Baha Mar developers, who had acquired their remaining landholdings from private owners.
Mr Smith, who headed the Hotel Corporation during the first Christie administration, when most of the land deals with the Izmirlian family were struck, also questioned whether Mr McCartney “wants to get the facts”.
“For a man who has ambition, he has to stop talking poppycock to the Bahamian people,” Mr Smith told Tribune Business. “The Bahamian people have a lot more sense than he gives them credit for.
“For an experienced lawyer who could always get the facts, unless he doesn’t want to get the facts, the combined amount of land the Government sold to Baha Mar was less than 400 acres.”
In response, the Democratic National Alliance (DNA) leader told Tribune Business that the amount of Government –owned real estate sold to Baha Mar was immaterial.
Mr McCartney said that regardless of whether it was 400 acres or 1,000 acres involved, prime real estate previously held ‘on trust’ for the Bahamian people was now close to being owned by the Chinese government.
“George Smith seems to have forgotten what Baha Mar received. It’s more than 400 acres,” Mr McCartney said. “George Smith recently seems to be speaking a lot of things from out of his head.
“At the end of the day, my position remains: Whether it’s 400 acres, whether it’s 1,000 acres, the Bahamian people are out of that land.”
Thomas Dunlap, Baha Mar’s president, in an affidavit filed in the Delaware Bankruptcy Court last week, confirmed that the project covered 1,000 acres via the acquisition and combination of some 30 land parcels.
Mr McCartney, in a prophetic interview with Tribune Business just prior to Baha Mar’s Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing last week, warned that Bahamians were in danger of being left “holding the bag” over yet another major real estate-based project.
He said successive administrations had neglected to require that the former Government-owned land at Cable Beach be returned to the Bahamian people if the $3.5 billion project either failed to complete or meet key obligations.
And, in a warning that has now assumed added importance, the DNA leader admitted it was “a bit concerning” that a Chinese state-owned entity might be in a position to foreclose on Baha Mar, and take possession of the real estate upon which its $2.4 billion loan is secured.
That state-owned entity is Baha Mar’s debt financier, the China Export-Import Bank, which is now locked in a Supreme Court battle with the Izmirlians and Baha Mar to enforce its security and legal rights over those land parcels.
Mr Smith, recalling the transactions that occurred under his chairmanship, said Baha Mar purchased 12 acres from the Hotel Corporation as part of the acquisition of the then-Radisson Cable Beach Resort.
That property is now the Melia Nassau Beach Resort, and the Hotel Corporation also sold to Baha Mar the 30 acres once used for the Hobby Horse race track. It also conveyed the Cable Beach Golf Course and its 110 acres to the Izmirlians, on the condition that the property’s use remained unchanged.
Mr Smith said Baha Mar also received an additional 100 acres from the Water & Sewerage Corporation, which were to be used for expanding the golf course “going up to the ridge”.
He added that the remaining 600 acres incorporated into the Baha Mar project had been acquired from a variety of private real estate owners. Not all has been taken for the $3.5 billion resort development, with some set aside for a public park.
“When we sold the Radisson to Izmirlian, it had a staff of about 900 people,” Mr Smith recalled. “The man agreed to keep all the staff, although he laid-off some in the passing of time.
“It was, for the Hotel Corporation, a reasonable deal. It retained the workforce, and we got a commitment to expand and improve the golf course, with better service for customers.”
Baha Mar also acquired and demolished the Cecil Wallace-Whitfield Centre, which formerly housed the Prime Minister’s Office and Ministry of Finance. And it did likewise with the former Commonwealth Bank and Fidelity Bank (Bahamas) branches, relocating them and Scotiabank to new Cable Beach locations at its own expense.
Mr Smith denied that the land sales/transfers to Baha Mar amounted to a ‘give away’ of the Bahamian people’s assets, arguing that successive governments had viewed them as a trade-off for job creation and increased entrepreneurial opportunities.
“It doesn’t look like the PLP and FNM governments were saying: ‘Take these properties, take these properties’,” he told Tribune Business. “These were deals well thought-out by outstanding Bahamians.”
Pointing out that both Perry Christie and Hubert Ingraham had agreed to various land transfers via Heads of Agreement negotiated by their respective governments, Mr Smith added: “These weren’t to give away Bahamian land without creating jobs and opportunities.”
Were the China Export-Import Bank to ‘take over’ Baha Mar through foreclosing on its security, it would have major implications for Bahamian sovereignty, the economy and tourism sector due to its ownership by the Beijing government.
“It goes back to the administration negotiating almost a give-away of Bahamian land, and not having in place where the land can be returned to the Bahamian people. This is, unfortunately, an example of that,” Mr McCartney told Tribune Business last week.
“That is prime property in the Bahamas; perhaps some of the best property in the Bahamas. This is a project that sits on about 1,000 acres of Bahamian property. We have a situation that is so uncertain about the eventual ownership of this property; what’s next if it doesn’t come to fruition?”
Comments
TheMadHatter 8 years, 8 months ago
As he is 99% of the time - Mr. McCartney is spot-on CORRECT here. I would be so happy to have a PM that is correct so much of the time, rather than the other two we've had whose numbers I would not want to speculate.
Basically the Heads-of-Agreement said (paraphrasing) "...if you make us your slaves, we will give you our land in return."
TalRussell 8 years, 8 months ago
Comrades, there you have the Baha Ma solution - put Georgie back in charge hotels.
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