Thursday, September 17, 2015
By RASHAD ROLLE
Tribune Staff Reporter
rrolle@tribunemedia.net
PRIME Minister Perry Christie said yesterday that his optimism for a successful outcome to the Baha Mar debacle has risen considerably after a Delaware Bankruptcy Court judge dismissed Baha Mar’s Chapter 11 proceedings on Tuesday.
Mr Christie said his administration is “pleased” that the US court agreed with his government that Baha Mar’s future should be decided in a Bahamian court.
“The government’s principal objective throughout this process has been, and continues to be, the completion of the Baha Mar resort such that it can open for business with a full complement of Bahamian workers as soon as humanly possible,” he told the House of Assembly.
“This is of vital importance to the continued growth of our national economy. My government therefore continues to regard the early completion and opening of the Baha Mar resort as a matter of the highest national priority.”
In a statement released last night, Baha Mar said it had viewed its Chapter 11 process “as the best path to address the liquidity crunch into which it was forced into by the failure of CCA Bahamas to perform on the very timetables it set and represented to both Baha Mar and the prime minister.”
CCA, China Construction America, is the resort’s general contractor.
“The facts are that both before and post it undertaking of the Chapter 11 process, Baha Mar vigorously made every effort to engage CCA and CEXIM (the Export Import Bank of China) in meaningful discussions to resolve the outstanding issues in order to enable construction to be completed and the resort to open, including making specific proposals.”
The resort added: “Baha Mar found itself to be one hand clapping. The fact is the resort is not completed. The fact is CCA, of its own volition, walked off the construction site in April. We believe a properly completed and opened Baha Mar is in the best interests of the Bahamas and agree with the government on that point.”
In addition, Mr Christie said the US court’s decision underscores that the interests of Baha Mar’s creditors are best served if the issue is litigated in the Bahamas.
He said: “The Delaware Bankruptcy Court agreed with the Bahamas Supreme Court when it stated that ‘…many stakeholders in the project would expect that any insolvency proceedings would take place in the Bahamas, the location of this major development project.’ One of the reasons that the investment climate in the Bahamas remains strong is that investors, be they Bahamian or non-Bahamian implicitly and explicitly repose confidence in the independence and competence of our courts, which have for decades resolved complex commercial litigation and the decisions of which have been upheld by the Privy Council, the highest court of the Bahamas.”
On Tuesday, US judge Kevin Carey threw out the Chapter 11 cases for Baha Mar companies in the Bahamas.
Baha Mar filed for bankruptcy protection in the US on June 29. This prompted the government to file a winding up petition against the resort.
The Supreme Court has subsequently appointed provisional liquidators to oversee the property. A hearing is scheduled on the matter for November 4.
Comments
GrassRoot says...
Define "successful".
Posted 17 September 2015, 2:19 p.m. Suggest removal
BaronInvest says...
You have to see it from a chinese perspective...
Posted 17 September 2015, 9:57 p.m. Suggest removal
ohdrap4 says...
successful= dead good
Posted 18 September 2015, 7:08 a.m. Suggest removal
sheeprunner12 says...
Interpretation: More kickbacks and deals for "the Sunshine boys" are on the way!!!!!!!!!!
Posted 17 September 2015, 3:32 p.m. Suggest removal
MonkeeDoo says...
PGC is very pleased that Pandora is back in the box and the cover has been nailed shut by the US Judge. Some enterprising investigative reporter should find out how those pools were paid for, or who gave the subcontract to Osprey Developers. Maybe Adam hasn't got paid yet and in turn not paid the subcontractor. But, if Osprey ends up in receivership, which is almost a certainty I think, then their financiers ( bankers ) will likely have to say ( show documents ) why they extended so much credit to them. "Well they had a contract with a US Company which had the prime contract for building Baha Mar Pools and Waterways, so we felt secure in advancing the credit."
Posted 17 September 2015, 4:25 p.m. Suggest removal
Sickened says...
I'm actually looking to build a pool and I would like to contract Adam to hire Osprey to build my pool. It just seems to make sense.
Thanks for the info MonkeeDoo. Perhaps I should hire you to contract Adam to hire Osprey to build my pool!
Posted 18 September 2015, 8:55 a.m. Suggest removal
sheeprunner12 says...
Perry is optimistic about Bahamar .............. like BAMSI, public education, National Health, the civil service, the buses and taxi service, Freeport, the Haitian problem, UR2.0 , crime, the crooked AG, his Cabinet ................... etc, etc, etc ......... he is so LOST!!!!
It will be interesting to see which MPs will support his re-election bid in the PLP
Posted 18 September 2015, 7:42 a.m. Suggest removal
cmiller says...
Perry is a lying liar who tells nothing but lying lies to people who really don't want to hear any more lies!!!!!!!!
Posted 18 September 2015, 7:52 a.m. Suggest removal
MonkeeDoo says...
Sickened: I think the number is in the phone book. If not, you can get Georgia White Pages online and look in Atlanta for Bernadette Christie. Adam may be there nowadays too.
Posted 18 September 2015, 11:43 a.m. Suggest removal
Well_mudda_take_sic says...
Christie has every reason to be happy. At the end of the day the Chinese, on a net basis, have no more invested in Baha Mar than the Izmirlian family, perhaps the equivalent of USD 1 billion at most. Monies from the credit facilities extended by China EXIM Bank went into the pockets of the Chinese construction company, the Chinese sub-contractors and all of their Chinese workers involved with the project. The conflict of interest in having Chinese financing married with Chinese construction/labour all but assured profits for the China state controlled enterprises would be padded as much as possible by the cutting of corners at the work site, which no doubt has resulted in hidden poor quality workmanship throughout the project that will cost hundreds of millions of dollars to fix. A full blown costly investigation by non-Chinese engineers would need to be done to reveal all of the serious shortcomings in the quality of the Chinese workmanship that has no doubt left the project's structures unsafe in many respects. The Chinese obviously put monies in other non-Chinese Bahamian pockets (and I'm not just talking about local Bahamian contractors!) in order to bring things to the failed state where they are today, leaving many poor Bahamians and Bahamian taxpayers left holding the proverbial empty bag. It's all about seeing the bigger picture.......a massive screwing of the Bahamian people by the Chinese crawling into bed with our greedy corrupt dimwitted politicians (in the same way they have done throughout much of Africa....starting with a stadium)......and we Bahamians all know the ones at the top of that very greedy list of self anointed political elite in our country who could not care less about the Bahamians who foolishly voted them into office!
Posted 18 September 2015, 11:44 a.m. Suggest removal
MonkeeDoo says...
http://tribune242.com/users/photos/2015…
These are Chinese apartment Blocks in China. Something wrong with the footings I understand.
Posted 18 September 2015, 11:54 a.m. Suggest removal
MonkeeDoo says...
Well_mudda.... : These non-Chinese Bahamian pockets you mention ? Anyone named Christie in that list ?
Posted 18 September 2015, 11:58 a.m. Suggest removal
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