Dear Editor,
We refer to the letter from Mr Christopher Ram published in the Stabroek News (March 27) captioned ‘Contrary to what Brassington says the feasibility study for the Marriott was submitted after the contract had been signed.’
We are surprised and disappointed that the Stabroek News should see fit to publish Mr Ram’s letter having decided not to publish the AHI press release of March 25 to which Mr Ram’s letter refers.
Our press release, in fact, pointed out that the statement attributed to Mr Ram, in the Kaieteur News publication of March, 24, taken verbatim from Mr Ram’s blog, that Mr Winston Brassington had “signed contracts for the [Marriott] Hotel since in October 2011 but only had the critical feasibility study done by a Miami-based consulting firm in September 2012,” is entirely false.
Mr Ram’s letter, which you published without your readers having the benefit of our press release, persists, falsely, that his statement was correct and attempts to offer as evidence, pictures of “a letter dated October 1, 2011 addressed by Mr Brassington to Mr Michael Zhang, Managing Director of SCG International Inc which was awarded the contract to build the hotel” and “the two front pages of a report of a feasibility study dated September 2012 of the project submitted to the Chairman, Atlantic Hotel Inc, Mr Brassington.”
Mr Ram has chosen, in his letter, to deliberately ignore the facts presented in our press release, which you did not publish, which point out that “Had Mr Ram been less intent on character assassination and less given to propaganda, instead of professional analysis and research, he would have discovered that the first market Feasibility Study undertaken with regard to the building of the Marriott Hotel was conducted by the Marriott Hotel Group in 2010. Mr Ram would have also discovered that a further independent study by a highly reputed international Miami based firm, HVS Consulting, was also conducted in 2010.”
Our press release also quoted at length from Notice Paper No 12 of the Tenth Parliament on February 15, 2012, which records the Minister of Finance responding to questions from the opposition on whether there was any feasibility study done prior to any agreements being signed. The Minister’s response was: “Yes, there was a market Feasibility Study conducted by the Marriott Hotel Group and one conducted in 2010 by an independent American firm which is being updated to 2012.”
Mr Ram has sent you copies of the front pages of the 2012 HVS Feasibility Study which, as the Minister of Finance explained in Parliament, was updated from the 2010 Study by HVS, submitted before any contracts were entered into for the construction of the hotel.
We are pleased to attach the below for your information, and if you wish, for publication, along with our letter:
- the exchange (Q&A) with the Minister in Parliament; ii. a copy of the relevant pages of the HVS Market Study and ‘Feasibility Analysis, effective date October 4, 2010; iii. the Marriott Market Study and Estimates of Future Operating Performance (January 2010), cover page; iv. the Marriott Estimates for Future Operating Performance (Feb 2011) cover page; v. Kaieteur News article dated Sunday May 13, 2012 headlined ‘Marriott Feasibility …“show and tell” session for opposition could be arranged – Finance Minister.’
As we pointed out in our press release, it has now become the habit of Mr Ram to publish in his blog, inaccurate, tasteless and, often, defamatory statements with regard to myself, NICIL and the Marriott Hotel without any reference to the facts or the truth. It is unfortunate that some media houses believe that they have a licence to indiscriminately republish Mr Ram’s utterances without any regard to the obvious inaccuracies in them.
Not surprisingly, the Kaieteur News which published Mr Ram’s allegations in the first place, has also refused to publish our response.
Amongst the ten principles of the Declaration of Chapúltepec adopted by the American Press Association, and to which, I believe, our media profess to subscribe and our government is a signatory, is a clause which recognizes that “The credibility of the press is linked with commitment to truth, to the pursuit of accuracy, fairness and objectivity …the objectivity …the obtainment of these goals and the respect for ethical and professional values may not be imposed. These are the exclusive responsibility of journalists and the media.” It is unfortunate that our media consistently fail to accept that responsibility while demanding freedom of the press.
We shall be writing to the Media Monitoring Unit of Gecom and to the Guyana Press Association, pointing out the unprofessional and completely unacceptable behaviour of our media in republishing Mr Ram’s false allegations without any attempt to verify their accuracy and then refusing to publish our response to these allegations which they publish.
Yours faithfully,
Winston Brassington
Chairman
AHI
