by Geralyn EdwardTHE $120 MILLION GOVERNMENT GUARANTEE that has kick-started the stalled Four Seasons project is not enough to complete the mammoth luxury facility. It was enough, however, to get the buy-in of confidence-shaken villa owners and creditors, said Professor Avinash Persaud. The respected international economist and financier who was invited by Prime Minister David Thompson last September to work with Government to get the project going again, said ideally the Paradise Beach, St Michael tourism project would have required at least$240 million to complete without further financing. “As a member of the National Council of Economic Advisors, I was well aware of Government’s tight fiscal position and indeed I have made my job harder by limiting the size of the Government guarantee to the minimum possible to get the project up on its feet.
“The size of the Government guarantee is not sufficient to ensure that the project does not need any further financing. It would have been ideal, from a private point of view, if the guarantee was twice its size. However, it would not be appropriate for Barbados. . . .My job is now three times harder by keeping the guarantee to this size,” he told BARBADOS BUSINESS AUTHORITY in an interview. The Government guarantee of a $120 million ANSA McAL Merchant Bank loan will see Paradise Beach Limited manage the construction of 26 luxury villas and a Four Seasons hotel.
Among the villa owners who have invested millions so far buying properties at Four Seasons are entertainment producer Simon Cowell and world-famous English composer Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber. Persaud said these and other investors who had already paid down more than $80 million for homes overlooking Paradise Beach “were very much committed to the project and committed to helping in the rebuilding process and have played an important role in the last nine months by helping me get this agreement together”. So far, 16 villas have been sold and Persaud said work would resume once villa owners signed off on a villa construction plan.
