Scrapping of Marriott’s casino tenders… Several ministers met with Princess Group to hear complaints -Minister Jaipaul Sharma says he was one demanded clarifications

Jun 02, 2019 News

Minister within the Ministry of Finance, Jaipaul Sharma, is insisting that he was the one who blew the whistle on the Marriott c

Minister Jaipaul Sharma

asino tender process which appeared to be flawed and which has now been scrapped.
Sharma was reportedly being accused of secretly meeting with representatives of Princess Group, which runs Princess Casino.
The Turkish-controlled group was one of a number of investors which signaled intentions to run a casino operation at the state-owned Marriott, in Kingston.
Princess Group and a Surinamese investor were said to be frontrunners while the evaluation process was being conducted last year.
However, the process was scrapped after National Industrial and Commercial Investments Limited (NICIL), which handles investments, said it was alerted to an irregular meeting and correspondence between the group and Minister Sharma.
The matter was reportedly raised at the highest levels in Government.
Over the weekend, Minister Sharma, when contacted, made it clear that it was Princess who came to him to complain about it said was a clear attempt to favour the Surinamese investor and that the evaluation process was flawed.
“All visits by Princess’ officials were done at my office on their request for an appointment to meet with me, so that in no way can be considered a private meeting. Also, I had informed the Chairman of AHI (Atlantic Hotels Inc.) and Minister of Finance (Winston Jordan) of the meeting.”
According to Sharma, when he met with the Princess officials, he was told that they had made appointments with other ministers including Jordan; then Minister of State, Joseph Harmon; then Minister of Business, Dominic Gaskin; and Minister Amna Ally.
“I was the first Minister that readily agreed to meet with them. So why would the person mention to the reporter that AHI quashed the EOI (Express of Interest) because of a private meeting with a minister?”
Kaieteur News learnt that Ministers Ally, Harmon and Gaskin all met with the Princess representatives who wanted to complain.
“In my opinion the evaluation of the EOI was basically being engineered to favor the other bidder and to disqualify Princess,” Sharma said.
It was also disclosed that Princess claimed it was not given enough time to submit documents.
AHI is the NICIL special purpose company that owns Marriott, a 197-room that opened in 2015 but which financing structure had depended on a casino and entertainment to make enough money to repay up to US$30M in debts to the banks and other creditors.
The Government of Guyana has taken over the loan after Marriott was unable to pay.
It was decided that an unfinished section of the hotel would be opened for investments for a casino.