The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

Questions were raised yesterday over whether China Construction America (CCA) can be trusted over its $250 million investment at The Pointe, given the revelations that had it had seemingly been less than forthcoming with its Baha Mar partners.

K P Turnquest, the Opposition’s deputy leader, asked whether CCA could be relied upon to make frank disclosures relating to its downtown Nassau project, given that it seemingly knew - but never informed the developer - that Baha Mar’s planned March 27 opening last year would be missed.

“That’s the thing that comes to my mind,” the east Grand Bahama MP told Tribune Business.

“If we are having issues at one project, it is certainly not good practice to have allowed them to proceed with another one, having not completed the first. Can we rely on the information they provide?”

He was backed by ex-Baha Mar director, Dionisio D’Aguilar, who told Tribune Business that the Christie administration “should be pi at what the Chinese have done” in relation to the $3.5 billion project, based on Tribune Business’s Monday revelations.

For CCA, in a confidential memo sent to its Beijing parent on January 20, 2015, warned that the Baha Mar project and its stakeholders faced “irreversible and catastrophic loss” unless drastic action was taken.

The memo, showing that Baha Mar’s general contractor knew the March 27 opening deadline was likely to be missed, was written just weeks after CCA reassured Prime Minister Perry Christie and the developer, Sarkis Izmirlian, all was well.

Referring to The Pointe, for which CCA is owner, developer and main contractor, Mr D’Aguilar said: “This is absolutely outrageous.

“To allow the Chinese to build that property on Bay Street is a slap in the face. They’re not to be trusted.”

The Pointe development, which is adjacent to the British Colonial Hilton, has already been the focus of several controversies.

The Ministry of Works’ Building Control division was previously forced to issue a temporary ‘stop work’ order, after construction progressed beyond what was allowed by CCA’s permits.

And the amount of Bahamian contractor and labour involvement, or lack of it, at The Pointe has been a frequent talking point in both the Bahamian construction industry and wider society.

Tribune Business understands the Government itself feels that it may have been misled by CCA over the level of Bahamian involvement and, certainly, whenever this newspaper has peeked through the curtains surrounding the site, the majority of construction workers appear to be Chinese.

This publication has seen very few Bahamian workers present, with local labour largely appearing to be concentrated in security services.

This, though, contrasts with statements at The Pointe’s groundbreaking on August 6, 2015, when it was said the project would employ 250 Bahamian construction workers.

Prime Minister Perry Christie said then that the plan was for Baha Mar to have been completed before CCA started work on The Pointe, but the dispute with the former’s developer forced a change.

Mr Turnquest, while acknowledging that Baha Mar’s 2,000 former Bahamian employees and local companies had been “let down by all sides, yesterday said this was being exacerbated by CCA’s use of Chinese labour at The Pointe.

“Now we have a situation in the Bahamas where Bahamian workers and contractors are looking in at work they can clearly do,” he told Tribune Business.

“With any project done in this country, Bahamians ought to benefit in the first instance, and where they lack the skills and numbers, then look to import workers. That should not be the first position, the first choice.”

The FNM deputy leader added that CCA’s January 20, 2015, memo also appeared to support Mr Izmirlian’s “claim that the contractor was responsible for those delays at Baha Mar”.

“It appears from that memo that they [Mr Izmirlian and Baha Mar] were in fact misled, and the contractor had recognised early on they had a difficulty, and they did not disclose it,” Mr Turnquest told Tribune Business.

“As a result, the developer, having relied on their public statements, went forward with his plans, commitments made, resulting in a loss. It certainly seems to me that something was amiss.”

He added:”I think there are some serious issues here that seem to be coming to light. If this is correct, and they did not communicate this information to the Prime Minister and the developer, I’m sure the developer will be looking into whether it’s actionable for any losses incurred as a result of the decisions made, and commitments undertaken.”

Mr Turnquest said the contents of the CCA memo also highlighted why the Government should have remained ‘neutral’ during last summer’s Baha Mar dispute, instead of taking sides with the Chinese.

He added that the Government should have remained outside the litigation and either been an independent mediator; hired someone else to perform the latter role; or left it to the courts.