Government does not believe that the $30 million which it lent to the owners of the yet-to-be-completed Casique Hotel is at risk and hopes to work with them to ensure that the hotel is completed and the money repaid.
Casique Palace, Suites and Banqueting Halls was to be completed in time for Guyana’s hosting of the super eight matches in the Cricket World Cup (CWC) in March. However, despite receiving a loan from the government this did not happen as the builders faced many difficulties. Among them were funding, the unique, detailed and ambitious architectural design of the building and the fact that the price in some building materials had soared.
“If they can’t complete the hotel we could get someone to do it so that they would be able to pay back,” President Bharrat Jagdeo told reporters yesterday, optimistic that government funds were not at risk.
Part owner George Smith, speaking with this newspaper from New York in October, had said that repayments to the government would begin by the end of this year. He had denied that construction on the building has stopped for some time.
Buddy’s International Hotel, which was built in time for the CWC games, benefited from some $168 million from the government to complete construction. The money was given as an advance for accommodation for the media and sponsors of the Cricket World Cup 2007.
