Fedee
(SNO) — A court injunction brought on by Landings Resort is holding back construction works of Sandals Resorts International (SRI) fourth hotel in Saint Lucia, called La Source.
The injunction was sought to settle a dispute between the resorts over a small portion of land that Tourism Minister Dominic Fedee, on a radio programme on Thursday (Sept. 27), said may have to do with the encroachment of a drain.
Attempts by SNO to get more information about the injunction from Landings were futile as the Resort is closed for its annual maintenance and upgrade programme. We were directed to the Resort’s Board of Directors however even this proved futile.
However, earlier this week, Sunil Ramdin, SRI regional public relations manager, admitted that an injunction was filed in the High Court “which unfortunately led to a delay in the works”.
“That delay has been going on for some period of time now. It’s a matter before the courts so we don’t really want to talk about it too much,” he said.
Ramdin added that Sandals, as a company, is anxious to see the matter settled as every day the matter stays unsolved is a cost to Sandals.
Admitting to the talk show host how unwise it would be to talk about the matter seeing that it is before the courts, Minister Fedee however attempted to shed some light as to how this may have come about. According to him there was a policy decision where Sandals and Landings agreed to give up part of their lands to expand the public access to the beach.
Landings, Fedee said, made allowance for that when they were building a fence on the northern side of their property, adjusting it five feet inwards.
He alluded that there might have been an encroachment of a drain, about four inches, by Sandals and identifying this as the area of conflict.
It was in May of this year that SRI held its sod turning ceremony for La Source, which will be nestled between Sandals Grande and Landings.
At that ceremony it was revealed that La Source will be a 385-room resort, with phenomenal suites, pools on the top floor overlooking both the Caribbean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean.
It was even said that approximately 1,200 persons would be employed during the construction phase with an anticipated completion date being 22 to 24 months.
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