Latest update February 6th, 2025 7:27 AM
Marriott owners (AHI) to pay $24,000 per month rent for 7 acres
….given option to buy for US$1M from NICIL
The company which has leased the land to build the proposed Georgetown Marriott Hotel, Atlantic Hotel Inc (AHI), has been given the option to purchase 6.8 acres land from the National Industrial and Commercial Investment’s Limited for US$1M.
This is according to the “Agreement to Lease of Land…made and entered into this 28th day of January, 2010” between NICIL and Atlantic Hotel Inc.
NICIL is headed by Winston Brassington but for the purposes of the Agreement which was recently made available after much public furor, the Holdings Company is represented by its Deputy Chief Executive officer/Company Secretary, Marcia Nadir-Sharma.
Nadir-Sharma is also the Company Secretary for AHI, which is also headed by Brassington and for the purposes of the agreement of lease, AHI was represented by Brassington.
In the agreement for the 6.8 acres of land which is located in the vicinity of the Pegasus Hotel Guyana and is considered beach front property, Brassington agrees that AHI will purchase the land from NICIL which Brassington also heads, “anytime after the commencement of the hotel operations of substantial completion of construction whichever is earlier.”
The other condition which is attached to the lease and must be satisfied before effecting such sale is simply informing NICIL of the intention with three months notice in writing.
The agreement entered into between Marcia Nadir-Sharma and Brassington says that the company will pay rent an annual rent of $1 per square foot.
One acre is equal to 43,560 square feet which would see the total rental for the plot being amounting to $296,208 per annum or $24,684 per month.
The 99-year lease agreement indicates that after five years the rent may be subjected to a review but that AHI will be given six month notice of any increase in rent.
AHI has also agreed with NICIL that the Government Holding Company will be paid annually the local rates and taxes for the plant of land and, “To pay to the appropriate authorities all property taxes, corporate taxes applicable and payable from time to time.”
It must be noted also that several million dollars have already been expended by the Government preparing the land for the project when it had re-routed the sewerage system networked on the locale of the 6.8 acres land for the proposed Georgetown Marriott.
Courtney Benn Construction Company Limited was initially awarded the US$700,000 contract to reroute the sewer lines in Kingston but after objections by foreign investors that the work was not being done to satisfactory standards that contract was pulled.
The ‘investor(s)’ who subsequently pulled out of the project were worried about the then existing network of sewerage pipelines.
Benn, however had been paid a substantial sum to purchase the pipes and to execute the project.
The foreign investor said that the substandard work was particularly related to the calibre of pipes being used by Courtney Benn.
The re-routing of the sewer lines was subsequently awarded to Adam Development/Urbahn Associates (ADUA).
ADUA who had objected to the substandard works being done subsequently commenced to undertake the same project using the same quality of pipes that had been objected to.
When the contact was pulled from Courtney Benn, President Bharrat Jagdeo had said that Guyana had lost capacity as a country.
In May 2008, ADUA brought in a team to lay new sewerage lines to allow the site to be cleared for construction. Local engineers had questioned the integrity of the work done and some of it had to be redone.
Today the Marriott is still to become a reality but the government has already plugged millions of dollars preparing for the project.
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