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Pierhead Marina Project Generating More Questions Than Answers – SMI Unable To Source Funding

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Imagine the pleasant surprise by many Barbadians when leader of the Opposition Owen Arthur announced he was calling the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) to order a few weeks ago, to investigate among other things, alleged shenanigans which surrounds the proposed Pierhead Marina Project. Unless BU missed the outcome of that meeting the opposition leader has flattered to deceive.

It does not take much to stoke the rising number of Barbadians who have become cynical about the actions of politicians. Yes opposition leader Owen Arthur raised the alleged malfeasance with the marina project at  a political meeting in Heroes Square before he replaced Mia Mottley. However given the serious of the charge it is mindboggling the opposition leader has remained silent on this matter.

Against the foregoing it is disturbing to read the following comment posted on BU: “I am reliably informed that SMI has been unable to source the funding required to carry the Pierhead Marina project, maybe this needs a little public ventilation. I guess this was one of the risks of awarding a contract to a non-bidder who was not experienced or qualified in marina construction.”

Here is another case where the lack of information by government has generated more questions than answers.

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52 responses to “Pierhead Marina Project Generating More Questions Than Answers – SMI Unable To Source Funding”

  1. Hants Avatar
    Hants

    It will take a miracle for any Investor to fund a Tourism project in this economic climate.

    Investors are only interested in making money.

    Both the Pierhead and Four seasons were conceptualized when Tourism in Barbados was booming and nobody foresaw the recession.

    Keep hoping for a miracle.

  2. David Avatar
    David

    @Hants

    to build on your point, is there any learnings to be had which can be directed at Four Seasons?

  3. The Scout Avatar
    The Scout

    All these fancy massive projects this government is dangling in the voters faces will not materialise. The marina, the hospital, cruise terminal, nonew of these will start before the next general elections, and then if they won they would say the funding is not available, but if they lose they would say they had everything in place but the new government messed up. I just hope our NIS $50 million is not given to Four Seasons; that matter has gone VERY SILENT. This government make a lot of un-necessary promises last general elections and have failed to deliver on most of them, it would be folly to come back after five years of broken promises to put more of the same on the voting public.

  4. Hants Avatar
    Hants

    @The Scout,
    Funding will be found for the Hospital.

    It is the other projects that will be problematic.

    They are good short to medium term ‘job creating projects” but very risky because the economies we depend on will likely have slow growth for the next 5 to 10 years.

    Doan mine me doh. I is jus a layman.

  5. Hants Avatar
    Hants

    David wrote “is there any learnings to be had which can be directed at Four Seasons?”

    not sure what you mean.

  6. millertheanunnaki Avatar
    millertheanunnaki

    @Hants | December 6, 2011 at 8:38 PM |
    “Funding will be found for the Hospital.”

    That’s very good to hear! Makes good electioneering sound-bite!
    But from whom? Foreign private investors? Certainly not local ones who don’t even want to put money in 4 Seasons? Maybe if it involved importing and retailing “ 4 different brands of seasonings” it would appeal to them!
    The only source that can be tapped is the IADB. But the structural adjustment measures that would come as “strings attached” might be most unpalatable for the political class to swallow.
    Another option is to demand reparations from Britain for over 300 years of colonialism and slavery. The reparations can come in the form of a brand new spanking hospital with the “quid pro quo” that we will continue with the royal branding of the hospital (no Don XXX memorial) and constitutional monarchy just for old time sake.

  7. Antz Avatar
    Antz

    @ David

    It is election silly season. Maybe its a case of position is the art of gunnery.

  8. Hants Avatar
    Hants

    @millertheanunnaki,

    I am not electioneering. Just stating the obvious.

  9. millertheanunnaki Avatar
    millertheanunnaki

    @ Hants | December 6, 2011 at 11:00 PM |

    OK! Your position noted! But just to repeat the obvious: Money does not grow on trees! Unless they are being felled!

  10. David Avatar
    David

    @Hants

    Simply elaborating on your point that the SMI appears to have floundered in attracting private investors given the bearish market for tourism investment. It probably explains why no local investors have stepped up to the Four Seasons plate.

  11. balance Avatar
    balance

    miller to the best of my knowledge nothing was here when the british came in 1627 so i am not sure if we can say that barbados if that was the name then or little england as it has been called was indeed colonised like for instance where there was a thriving civilisation and culture.

  12. Antz Avatar
    Antz

    It could be that having confirmed that the PAC would investigate the matter, OSA has turned off potential investors and financiers.

  13. millertheanunnaki Avatar
    millertheanunnaki

    @ balance | December 7, 2011 at 5:08 AM |

    Who do you think used to feed those early shipwreck sailors and early English settlers? The figs from the Bearded trees? But alas diseases and sugar cane put an end to the Amerindian (Arawak) thriving “civilization”.

  14. balance Avatar
    balance

    according to which ever historian of barbadian history you care to believe (the role of bussa as an emancipator notwithstanding) they all seem to agree on one thing that the arawaks and caribs were long gone when mr william courteen landed in 1627. so unlike for example places with government and culture india, zimbabawe, south africa, senegal, and the now united states of america, barbados was not colonised.there was nothing here.

  15. Adaptor Avatar
    Adaptor

    @ David

    If indeed the funding has fallen thru for SMI then the Minister of Finance needs to get the people an explanation.
    ——————————————————————————————————
    In an interview on the April 17 edition of Brass Tacks Sunday, Finance Minister Christopher Sinckler, responding to the news that a former bidder on the marina project was claiming that government had breached a contract with it, said the Freundel Stuart administration believed it had acted correctly.

    The finance minister said he was “confident” that the administration had a very good chance of prevailing if the matter did go to court to decide who was right and who was wrong in the revoking of one contract and the awarding of another.

    Earlier in the day, the Sunday Sun broke the story that another firm which had been involved in bidding for the marina project was claiming compensation of over US$30 from the government, although no lawsuit had as yet been filed.

    The paper disclosed that Attorney-at-Law Elliott Mottley, representing Lagan Construction, had written to the Freundel Stuart administration, arguing that in a letter from then BTII chairman Dr. Jerry Thorne dated November 13, 2009, the state-owned development company had “created a contractual relationship” to negotiate with the British firm, which had afterwards been revoked.

    Mr. Mottley said Lagan would seek to recover the approximately quarter of a million US dollars it had spent in connection with its bid plus another US$30 million which it had determined to be its “lost benefit” from the project.

    The Sun also summarised a reply from BTII Legal Counsel Adrian King to the effect that Lagan Construction had been advised not to rely on Dr. Thorne’s representations, and that in the BTII’s opinion the Lagan design could not have been built. The letter from Mr. King also cited a provision in the instructions to bidders to the effect that the BTII had reserved the right to select, annul or reject all bidders at any time prior to the award of the contract without incurring liability.

    Despite the upbeat response of the finance minister, the legal posturings cast a pall over the announcement earlier last week by Mr. Sinckler, via in a statement to the House of Assembly, that a Memorandum of Understanding had been signed with SMI Infrastructure Solutions Inc. by the government-owned Barbados Tourism Investment Inc. (BTII) for the construction of a marina at Pierhead Lane in Bridgetown.

    Minister of Finance Chris Sinckler said the MOU had been signed “after the successful completion of the tendering process,” for a Build, Own, Lease and Transfer (BOLT) financing arrangement for the marina, which has long been proposed, with an earlier version being private sector-driven. After several years of trying, Barbados Shipping & Trading Co. Ltd., at the time the island’s largest publicly-traded company, effectively bowed out of its leadership role in the project, which would have seen much of the land owned by the company in the Pierhead area incorporated into the marina project. The current project will be constructed entirely offshore, with some eleven acres of land being reclaimed in the process.

    The new marina’s cost was estimated at US$101 million, with the government paying annual lease payments of US$10.1 million at an annual interest rate of 8.8 per cent. Therefore, over the 25 years of the lease this BOLT will cost US$252.5M million, including interest payments totalling US$151.5 million.

    However, Mr. Sinckler said the government could recoup about US$66 million from the sale of reclaimed lands and approximately 80 berths, and lease payments would reduce over time if such monies were used to pay down the initial cost.

    The minister’s statement said “This transformational tourism infrastructure project will assist in repositioning the Barbados tourism product offering, while being the catalyst for the regeneration of Bridgetown.”

    He added that the development of the marina will result in the enhancement of the beach next to the marina in Carlisle Bay. Other economic benefits included the injection of foreign exchange into Barbados, the creation of hundreds of jobs during construction and permanent jobs after construction, and the “repositioning of Barbados’ tourism product.” The marina should also act as a catalyst for major new investment along Bay Street, he said.
    Construction is expected to commence in about nine months and take about two years to complete.

    On Friday April 15, the media was given more information on the project at a presentation held at the Hilton Barbados.

    In his remarks at the press event, BTII Chairman Andrew Marryshow noted that while the agency had received kudos for its role in the urban rehabilitation of Bridgetown, with projects such as the redevelopment of Jubilee Gardens and the renewal of Independence Square, “our capital city is yet to see a transformational project which creates the potential for new business opportunities for Barbadians. It is expected that the construction of the marina will result in the transformation of the waterfront of Bridgetown while creating new business and employment opportunities with the development of hotels, condominiums and shops.”
    He added that the project is in the middle of “the area identified for coastal tourism master planning purposes,” which stretches from Savannah Hotel to Batts Rock, just beyond the Black Rock

  16. uneducated Avatar
    uneducated

    @Balance

    All the lands in the new world were occupied when the Europeans came ashore. why would Barbados be free of civilization and our neighbour st vincent was occupied. ponder on that for a while.

  17. Green Monkey Avatar
    Green Monkey

    Seems like the end of growth would also imply the end of tourism as an industry (and therefore the end of tourism mega projects).

    ‘Net Energy’ ignorance reigns on Capitol Hill
    by Megan Quinn Bachman

    “I don’t think there will ever again be sustained economic growth.” —U.S. Rep. Roscoe Bartlett (R–MD)

    “We need to recognize that the U.S. economy is no longer capable of growing at three percent per year.” —Jeff Rubin, former chief economist, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce (CIBC)

    If there is one unshakable belief in America today it’s that the U.S. economy can and must continue to grow.

    That’s why the messages delivered in November in Washington D.C. at a gathering of oil geologists, scientists, economists and others challenging that core belief went largely unheeded in the nation’s capital.

    The approximately 300 people who attended the 7th Annual Conference of the Association for the Study of Peak Oil–USA (ASPO-USA) in the shadow of the U.S. Capitol were told that economic growth is no longer possible as oil production flattens and declines, that U.S. energy independence is impossible and that domestic shale gas will fall far short of fueling American prosperity even while polluting the nation’s vital aquifers.

    “This is a place where facts don’t have the weight I would like them to have,” one congressional staffer said of Washington while meeting on Capitol Hill with a delegation from the ASPO-USA conference, held over three days at the nearby Hyatt Regency with its opening session at the Congressional Auditorium in the U.S. Capitol.

    The facts presented at the conference, titled Truth in Energy, were grim. Global conventional oil production has reached a plateau after 150 years of fueling the fastest and greatest growth in history, according to various speakers, and as production heads into irreversible decline, Americans should prepare for a future of fewer jobs, less money,reduced mobility and dramatically diminished energy use (my emphasis /GM).

    snip

    It is not surprising that those in the seat of power won’t touch peak oil. After all, as the energy available to our society diminishes year after year, collapse is inevitable. And collapse runs contrary to the story of American ingenuity and triumph. As retired CIA analyst and now journalist Tom Whipple pointed out at the conference, America’s most dominant religion is not Christianity but the belief in economic growth, and those who contradict that core belief are heretics.

    http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2011-12-07/%E2%80%98net-energy%E2%80%99-ignorance-reigns-capitol-hill

  18. Adaptor Avatar
    Adaptor

    Minister of Finance Chris Sinckler said the MOU had been signed “after the successful completion of the tendering process,” for a Build, Own, Lease and Transfer (BOLT) financing arrangement for the marina, which has long been proposed, with an earlier version being private sector-driven

    Was the above statement by Minister of Finance, Christopher Sinckler in the House of Assembly true or correct? The attorneys for BTII have admitted in open correspondence that the award of the contract to SMI by way of a MOU was NOT done pursuant to the bidding documents and rules.

  19. Adaptor Avatar
    Adaptor

    @ David

    If indeed the funding has fallen thru for SMI then the Minister of Finance needs to get the people an explanation.
    ——————————————————————————————————
    In an interview on the April 17 edition of Brass Tacks Sunday, Finance Minister Christopher Sinckler, responding to the news that a former bidder on the marina project was claiming that government had breached a contract with it, said the Freundel Stuart administration believed it had acted correctly.

    The finance minister said he was “confident” that the administration had a very good chance of prevailing if the matter did go to court to decide who was right and who was wrong in the revoking of one contract and the awarding of another.

    Earlier in the day, the Sunday Sun broke the story that another firm which had been involved in bidding for the marina project was claiming compensation of over US$30 from the government, although no lawsuit had as yet been filed.

    The paper disclosed that Attorney-at-Law Elliott Mottley, representing Lagan Construction, had written to the Freundel Stuart administration, arguing that in a letter from then BTII chairman Dr. Jerry Thorne dated November 13, 2009, the state-owned development company had “created a contractual relationship” to negotiate with the British firm, which had afterwards been revoked.

    Mr. Mottley said Lagan would seek to recover the approximately quarter of a million US dollars it had spent in connection with its bid plus another US$30 million which it had determined to be its “lost benefit” from the project.

    The Sun also summarised a reply from BTII Legal Counsel Adrian King to the effect that Lagan Construction had been advised not to rely on Dr. Thorne’s representations, and that in the BTII’s opinion the Lagan design could not have been built. The letter from Mr. King also cited a provision in the instructions to bidders to the effect that the BTII had reserved the right to select, annul or reject all bidders at any time prior to the award of the contract without incurring liability.

    Despite the upbeat response of the finance minister, the legal posturings cast a pall over the announcement earlier last week by Mr. Sinckler, via in a statement to the House of Assembly, that a Memorandum of Understanding had been signed with SMI Infrastructure Solutions Inc. by the government-owned Barbados Tourism Investment Inc. (BTII) for the construction of a marina at Pierhead Lane in Bridgetown.

    Minister of Finance Chris Sinckler said the MOU had been signed “after the successful completion of the tendering process,” for a Build, Own, Lease and Transfer (BOLT) financing arrangement for the marina, which has long been proposed, with an earlier version being private sector-driven. After several years of trying, Barbados Shipping & Trading Co. Ltd., at the time the island’s largest publicly-traded company, effectively bowed out of its leadership role in the project, which would have seen much of the land owned by the company in the Pierhead area incorporated into the marina project. The current project will be constructed entirely offshore, with some eleven acres of land being reclaimed in the process.

    The new marina’s cost was estimated at US$101 million, with the government paying annual lease payments of US$10.1 million at an annual interest rate of 8.8 per cent. Therefore, over the 25 years of the lease this BOLT will cost US$252.5M million, including interest payments totalling US$151.5 million.

    However, Mr. Sinckler said the government could recoup about US$66 million from the sale of reclaimed lands and approximately 80 berths, and lease payments would reduce over time if such monies were used to pay down the initial cost.

    The minister’s statement said “This transformational tourism infrastructure project will assist in repositioning the Barbados tourism product offering, while being the catalyst for the regeneration of Bridgetown.”

    He added that the development of the marina will result in the enhancement of the beach next to the marina in Carlisle Bay. Other economic benefits included the injection of foreign exchange into Barbados, the creation of hundreds of jobs during construction and permanent jobs after construction, and the “repositioning of Barbados’ tourism product.” The marina should also act as a catalyst for major new investment along Bay Street, he said.
    Construction is expected to commence in about nine months and take about two years to complete.

    On Friday April 15, the media was given more information on the project at a presentation held at the Hilton Barbados.

    In his remarks at the press event, BTII Chairman Andrew Marryshow noted that while the agency had received kudos for its role in the urban rehabilitation of Bridgetown, with projects such as the redevelopment of Jubilee Gardens and the renewal of Independence Square, “our capital city is yet to see a transformational project which creates the potential for new business opportunities for Barbadians. It is expected that the construction of the marina will result in the transformation of the waterfront of Bridgetown while creating new business and employment opportunities with the development of hotels, condominiums and shops.”
    He added that the project is in the middle of “the area identified for coastal tourism master planning purposes,” which stretches from Savannah Hotel to Batts Rock, just beyond the Black Rock

  20. millertheanunnaki Avatar
    millertheanunnaki

    @ balance | December 7, 2011 at 5:32 PM |
    “they all seem to agree on one thing that the arawaks and caribs were long gone when mr william courteen landed in 1627. ”

    If you believe that you would also believe that Jesus was a white man with blue eyes and blonde hair!

  21. Random Thoughts Avatar
    Random Thoughts

    Quoting balance of December 7 at 5:08 a.m. “to the best of my knowledge nothing was here when the british came in 1627 so i am not sure if we can say that barbados…was indeed colonised.
    Dear balance: There are the colonised and the colonisers. Barbados was certainly colonised by the British, and I am sure that I do not need to tell you that the British colonisers, FORCED tens of thousands of people, many of them mere children away from West Africa to Barbados between 1627 and 1834. And then forced labour out these people in the 90 degree heat and the 90 degree humidity; and continued to force labour from their children, and their children’s children for many generations until 1838. These many generations of forced African slave migrants received NO WAGES for 211 years, and their labour is estimated to be worth about 5% of the British economy at the time.
    Ok. Let’s do the math. 211 years worth of wages X tens of thousands of people is worth how much MONEY again? And we have not started to put a monetary value of the suffering caused caused by forcing families to separate, and forcing people from their homelands.
    So yes I would say that Barbados was INDEED colonised.

  22. balance Avatar
    balance

    cut out the long talk uneducated and random thoughts and just tell me who was living in barbados when the british came purportedly in 1627. i need to be educated.

  23. PM, call elections NOW Avatar
    PM, call elections NOW

    We have missed the turn… we actually need leaders to lead us back, not forward, to that turn, so that we move ahead.

  24. Green Monkey Avatar
    Green Monkey

    What Peak Oil Looks Like
    by John Michael Greer

    There are times when the unraveling of a civilization stands out in sharp relief, but more often that process makes itself seen only in the sort of scattered facts and figures that take a sharp eye to notice and assemble into a meaningful picture. How often, I wonder, did the prefects of imperial Rome look up from the daily business of mustering legions and collecting tribute to notice the crumbling of the foundations on which their whole society rested?

    snip

    The point that has to be grasped just now, it seems to me, is that this is what peak oil looks like. Get past the fantasies of sudden collapse on the one hand, and the fantasies of limitless progress on the other, and what you get is what we’re getting—a long ragged slope of rising energy prices, economic contraction, and political failure, punctuated with a crisis here, a local or regional catastrophe there, a war somewhere else—all against a backdrop of disintegrating infrastructure, declining living standards, decreasing access to health care and similar services, and the like, which of course has been happening here in the United States for some years already. A detached observer with an Olympian view of the country would be able to watch things unravel, as such an observer could have done up to now, but none of us have been or will be detached observers; at each point on the downward trajectory, those of us who still have jobs will be struggling to hang onto them, those who have lost their jobs will be struggling to stay fed and clothed and housed, and those crises and catastrophes and wars, not to mention the human cost of the broader background of decline, will throw enough smoke in the air to make a clear view of the situation uncommonly difficult to obtain.

    snip

    Here again, those scattered facts and figures I mentioned back at the beginning of this week’s post are a better guide than any number of comforting assurances, and the facts I have in mind just at the moment were brought into focus by an intriguing essay by ecological economist Herman Daly.

    In the murky firmament of today’s economics, Daly is one of the few genuinely bright stars. A former World Bank official as well as a tenured academic, Daly has earned a reputation as one of the very few economic thinkers to challenge the dogma of perpetual growth, arguing forcefully for a steady state economic system as the only kind capable of functioning sustainably on a finite planet. The essay of his that I cited above, which I understand is scheduled to be published in an expanded form in the journal Ecological Economics, covers quite a bit of ground, but the detail I want to use here as the starting point for an unwelcome glimpse at the constraints bearing down on our future appears in the first few paragraphs.

    In his training as an economist, Daly was taught, as most budding economists are still taught today, that inadequate capital is the most common barrier to the development of the so-called “developing” (that is, nonindustrial, and never-going-to-develop) nations. His experience in the World Bank, though, taught him that this was almost universally incorrect. The World Bank had plenty of capital to lend; the problem was a shortage of “bankable projects”—that is, projects that, when funded by a World Bank loan, would produce the returns of ten per cent a year or so that would be needed to pay off the loan and and also contribute to the accumulation of capital within the country.

    http://www.energybulletin.net/stories/2011-12-08/what-peak-oil-looks

  25. Wily Coyote Avatar
    Wily Coyote

    @ millertheanunnaki

    Better be careful about “demanding reparations from Britain for over 300 years of colonialism and slavery” Britain just may take up the offer, kick out all present day slave descendants and repatriate the island for themselves, remember they own most of it already.

  26. balance Avatar
    balance

    wily coyote, most of it, all of it. they just gave us as a gift because it is of no use to them. i know it is a hard pill to swallow but british people were the first developers of barbados and then the jews brought the sugar plant from brazil and the trest is history slavery and all.

  27. David Avatar
    David

    @Antz

    Are you suggesting OAS abused one of the most important working committees of parliament?

  28. balance Avatar
    balance

    random and uneducated seem to have lost their tongue or they are perusing books on caribbean history. as for reparations, reparations were paid when the descendants of former slaves were permitted to enter the mother country and her other advanced colonies to eat of the plenty crumbs falling from the table of the empire which has translated according to reports into the millions of dollars repatriated over the years and which has resulted in lifting the families of emigrants from the depths of poverty to which they would have been consigned had not these doors heen opened.

  29. Antz Avatar
    Antz

    @ David

    I am not suggesting anything, I am just putting forward one of the potential politically motivations of OSA when he called for the PAC to investigate the matter.

    The deal with SMI was a ‘mess’ from the beginning and would cost this country tens of millions of dollars per year for 25 years. In addition, having taken the project away from a company who was awarded the contract, the BTI and its advisors have cost the country to defend a claim for Bds$70 odd million dollars for breaching that agreement, all of this just so that SMI could be ‘given’ a contract to build something it has no experience with, this company does not even have an office, a fax machine, an email address or own a pancart.

  30. David Avatar
    David

    @Antz

    Are you suggesting there is similarity in the profile of SMI to that of 3S?

  31. Antz Avatar
    Antz

    @ David or Peter

    3S is of no concern to me. If SMI and 3S look alike then so be it, they are what they are, no?

    The entire board of the BTI should be made to resign for having exposed the BTI and the GOB to a claim for $70 million dollars. The politicians can play politics but those so-called professional people at the BTI who have created this sorid ‘mess’ shout be held accountable.

    Also, why would the PM be looking into Senator Gilkes travelling at the tax payers expense to Monaco to be looking for a operator for the Pierhead Marina.

  32. David Avatar
    David

    @Antz

    You seem to be brimming over with info which you are releasing in drips and drabs. Wouldn’t the Senator’s travel have been authorized by someone?

    The storyline here is different party same crap.

  33. Antz Avatar
    Antz

    Would you not be ideally placed to know who authorized the travel?

    I am not brimming over at all, just waiting to see upon who’s neck the hatchet falls. OSA was right when he said the award of the project was ‘perverted’, however the bigger issue is what is the identity of the ‘pervert’ and what will become of him or them.

  34. David Avatar
    David

    @Antz

    Why do you suggest BU is placed to know these things?

  35. millertheanunnaki Avatar
    millertheanunnaki

    @Antz | December 10, 2011 at 2:29 PM |

    FS must seek to weed out these corrupting influences in his government starting with the total neutraliation of the so called energy man whose 2008 & 2009 budgetary recommendations at that time to a naive MoF can be deemed as the primary factors responsible for the reinforcement of the skyrocketing of the fiscal deficit and a drag on the economy whose sluggishness has brought growth in the economy to a virtual standstill.

    We all know that the international recession took its toll on tourism, international business and FDI. But if these destructive anti-growth budgetary measures were not thrown like petrol on the emerging flame ignited by the recession Barbados would not be in so very hot waters. The current MoF should stop blaming the previous administration and look to removing those punitive measures dreamed up by the imaginative marina redesign inside man who is most likely associated with the Monaco visit to gamble with the idea of getting HNWI’s to Invest in Barbados. Maybe this is part of the lost US$ ½ billion in FDI which sailed away from Bim when the new man at the top got wind of it all.

  36. Antz Avatar
    Antz

    @ millertheanunnaki

    I now understand that the PM is going to be announcing a Cabinet reshuffle in the nest few days.

  37. David Avatar
    David

    @Antz

    Why are you playing games with BU? PM FS is not the sort to broadcast his moves.

  38. Antz Avatar
    Antz

    @ David

    You seem to know the PM well or are you just forming an opinion from what you have seen? Somebody going on the back bench that is for sure.

    Sapphire Apartment 312, Monday night, who was there. Who was photographed walking along the corridor and into the room?

  39. David Avatar
    David

    @Antz

    One does not have to be a bosom buddy of PM Stuart to know that he is not one who would blabber at the bar with the ‘boys’.

  40. millertheanunnaki Avatar
    millertheanunnaki

    @Antz | December 10, 2011 at 3:20 PM |
    FS telegraphs his intended actions in circuitous ways which you need to carefully follow, pick up the dropped beads of political craftiness and string them all together.
    He could use the opportunity of announcing a new GG to also reshuffle the cabinet. Reduce the size of the cabinet by not reappointing lack of energy and ideas man along with the physical deficit talker (this might be hard since boys from the east tend to stick together except for one). An exchange between finance and agriculture might create some cross-fertilisation and replace more action with mere talk.

  41. High-Speed Avatar
    High-Speed

    @ millertheanunnaki

    You are right, the boys from the East don’t break ranks, especially those from Brereton so Jepter ain’t going anywhere other than in a Ministry to replace either the Lashley or Boyce, go figure.

    Is Senator Boyce not named in the claim by Lagan of Malfeasance in Public Office? How will Owen deal with Darcy now that his backside is exposed?

    If I was FS I would not look beyond Lashley or Sinckler, the known JADA money boys and give one or both a hard slap and pitch them out of the Cabinet. The fact is that Sinckler is a brute and his clumsiness has no place in the Ministry of Finance. David Estwick would make a fine Minister of Finance and Deputy Prime Minister plus he would not be owned by Bjerkham or any other person ot entity.

    @ Antz

    These are the names of the people who were at Sapphire 321 on Monday according to my source:

    1. Hartley Henry
    2. Peter Wickham
    3. Chris Sinckler
    4. Michael Lashley
    5. Bjorn Bjerkham
    6. Mark Maloney
    7. Phillip Tempro
    8. Hallem Nicholls

  42. David Avatar
    David

    @Hi-Speed

    and why would there be this unholy alliance?

  43. Hants Avatar
    Hants

    David | December 7, 2011 at 1:45 AM |

    “@Hants
    It probably explains why no local investors have stepped up to the Four Seasons plate.”

    David the local Investors probably follow the stock markets around the world and watch CNN, BBC news and CBC Canada more than I do.
    They are just as concerned about the state of the world economy as a hand to mout fella like me.

    Four Seasons went after NIS money because they are aware of the Government’s need for a major “make work” program.

  44. BAFBFP Avatar
    BAFBFP

    wait High-Speed

    You don’ feel that FS is a JADA money boy too …? Man he ain’ a lawyer, and wid a shaky seat to boot …?

  45. David Avatar
    David

    @Hants

    Then the question we should ask is why do we need Persaud then? Wasn’t he suppose to bring the private investors? At least he gets to keep his Merk.

  46. Antz Avatar
    Antz

    @ BAFBFP

    If Staurt is a JADA money boy as you ask seemingly to suggest, then why won’t the JADA boys not have invited him to the meeting at Sapahire to discuss the plan to land Sinckler as PM.

    The PM is a honourable man although not just plucked from a monestery so he knows the way things work in the real world. The problem is that alot of people in the business community, who accustomed to getting what they want (by money) can’t get PM Stuart to play ball.

    I am told Bjorn Bjerkham was refused a recent request to meet the PM.

  47. Ping Pong Avatar
    Ping Pong

    At this time of national economic distress, I am despondent to awake this morning to read that:

    – the members of the Administration appear to be fighting each other at a time when unity and common purpose is needed more than ever,

    – the NIS is going to throw away money in Four Seasons against the advice of their own consultants,

    – Lagan is going to sue the Government over the B’town marina project which is being awarded to a company (or individual) under less than transparent circumstances,

    – and Barrack will have to wait for his money despite the ruling of the High Court in his favour.

    Tell me it’s all just a bad dream..

  48. Ping Pong Avatar
    Ping Pong

    What next?!! Shall the Government announce that taxpayers’ money will be used to bail out CLICO debts while allowing Parris and company to keep all the assets?!!

  49. Antz Avatar
    Antz

    Somebody like they rolling the wicket for OSA.

  50. balance Avatar
    balance

    me thinks definitely a motley set of bedfellows at sapphire 312 indeed with mr arthur’s bosom buddy and henchman among the group.

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