The cost of the Marriott Hotel could effectively be US$100M with the two Hong Kong investors owning 67% of it for a paltry US$8M, according to former Auditor General Anand Goolsarran who again roasted the terms of the deal and its lack of transparency.
In his column appearing in today’s Stabroek News, Goolsarran used the government’s own figures to argue his case that the taxpayers of the country were getting a raw deal.
Noting that equity participation plus debt financing for the hotel totalled US$58M, Goolsarran added to this figure US$20M for what he said was the estimated value of the “virtual giveaway of seven acres of prime ocean property”. The land is being leased by the special purposes company set up by the government, Atlantic Hotel Inc (AHI) for US$120 per month with the option to buy.
Goolsarran also added to this figure the estimated interest charges over the three-year construction period for the debt-financed component and said this could easily add another US$6.2M to the bottom line. The former auditor general also factored into the final cost figure the US$2M that government holding company NICIL spent on development