Raphael John-Lall

The San­dals re­sort in To­ba­go will be one of the biggest ever built by the Ja­maican-owned ho­tel brand, Je­re­my Jones, Di­rec­tor, Cor­po­rate Ser­vices, San­dals, said yes­ter­day.

“It will end up be­ing one of our largest projects both as a re­sult of hav­ing a foot­print and hav­ing a San­dals and Beach­es side by side. We have nev­er re­al­ly done that be­fore but it gives us the ben­e­fit of the economies of scale be­ing able to bring two op­er­a­tions un­der one um­brel­la so close to each oth­er. To­ba­go is go­ing to be an ide­al lo­ca­tion to do this,” he said dur­ing a me­dia brief­ing on the project at San­dals Ho­tel, Bar­ba­dos.

Jones said San­dals, which is ap­proach­ing its 37th an­niver­sary, is now in sev­en Caribbean is­lands op­er­at­ing un­der the Beach­es and San­dals brands.

He said there is no se­cre­cy about the To­ba­go deal which ge de­scribed as be­ing “in a con­ver­sa­tion stage”.

Jones ex­plained: “Our im­pres­sion of it is the Gov­ern­ment has in­vit­ed us to the des­ti­na­tion and we are very hap­py to do so. When you look at the re­al es­tate that is go­ing to be de­vel­oped and built and the in­cen­tives that will be grant­ed . . . what you saw here was a pret­ty im­pres­sive con­struc­tion fa­cil­i­ty and a great op­er­a­tion.

“We see in­cen­tives giv­en as an in­vest­ment by the Gov­ern­ment, not nec­es­sar­i­ly in the op­er­a­tor, but in the coun­try.”

He said when San­dals be­gan op­er­a­tions in Bar­ba­dos and Grena­da there was pub­lic dis­clo­sure of all the in­cen­tives that were grant­ed. He point­ed out that San­dals is ne­go­ti­at­ing with the Gov­ern­ment, not with a po­lit­i­cal par­ty, so if a new par­ty takes of­fice, the com­pa­ny will con­tin­ue their in­vest­ments in the coun­try.

“We feel that the in­tegri­ty of the Gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go will stand the test of par­ties chang­ing pow­er,” Jones said.

He con­firmed that the deal will be closed off by the end of No­vem­ber.

“We are very hap­py with the way it has pro­gressed. The con­ver­sa­tions tak­ing place in the pub­lic is not a big is­sue for us as we want every­one to be ful­ly aware of what we are do­ing,” Jones said.

Howeer, he is not sure the project will be com­plet­ed be­fore the next gen­er­al elec­tions.

“That is go­ing to be tight, with a de­vel­op­ment of that size com­mit­ting to un­der two years to get it done,” Jones said.