[caption id="attachment_81115" align="alignleft" width="300"]
A recruitment ad posted last year[/caption]
Despite the relaxation of curfew, resumption of construction projects, and reopening of hotels, an opening date for the much-hyped Sheraton Colombo Hotel is nowhere in sight.
Sheraton Colombo is a 320-room project and is part of the world’s largest hotel chain, Marriott International, Inc. It was earlier scheduled to be opened in the first half of 2020, but even to date, the developers nor Marriot have confirmed an opening date.
Other notable projects in Colombo such as Prime Grand, Marina Square, and the massive Cinnamon Life have commenced construction work recently following a standstill of over two months due to the Covid-19 curfew. All hotels in Colombo have also been reopened.
It is understood that much of the exterior construction of the project is complete and only a few minor interior developments need to be made. However, cash flow issues, mainly brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic, are said to be holding back the project and preventing the payment of salaries to employees.
The project was mired in controversy recently as a group of employees were laid off in January this year prior to the local Covid-19 outbreak. Laid off employees alleged that the management of Sheraton did not progress the construction and other preparatory work with a genuine focus to open on schedule, raising questions on whether the project has been abandoned.
However, when The Sunday Morning Business contacted Don Gamini Gunaratne, the Chairman of Lanka Hotels and Residencies (Pvt.) Ltd., the developer of the project, he assured that the project is not abandoned and confirmed that the hotel will be opened within this year.
“No one is going to spend a hundred million dollars on a project just to abandon it. The hotel will be opened even if we have cash flow issues. Those will not be an impediment for us to open the hotel,” he added.
According to Gunaratne, over 97% of Sheraton Colombo’s construction work has been completed as they earlier planned to open the hotel in June 2020, while only minor works and interior has to be built which too would be completed soon.
When asked about laid off employees, he stated that they had to be laid off mainly due to the cash flow issues created by Covid-19.
Around 100 employees of Sheraton Colombo were given letters of termination with the assurance of rehiring them after opening the hotel. The hotel is paying a 25% retainer fee monthly to all these employees.
“Employees have their own views; people who go apart will also have their own issues. But before Covid-19, salaries were being paid to everyone. Even after, they were all paid until the end of April,” he added.
Sheraton Colombo came into the limelight when the group of employees who were laid off by Sheraton wrote a letter to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa in April this year, identifying themselves as “victimised employees of Sheraton Colombo Hotel”.
The letter, which has been seen by The Sunday Morning Business, alleges that there has been large-scale financial misappropriation under the pretext of “foreign investment” by the Indian owners of M/s Lanka Hotels and Residencies (also known as Sheraton Colombo).
“We were enlisted to the Sheraton Colombo from January 2020, and the hotel was to open at the end of March 2020. However, as we have witnessed, the Indian management did not progress the construction and other preparatory work of this hotel project properly and with the genuine focus of opening the hotel by the end of March 2020. We are now compelled to think that Covid-19 situation was a blessing in disguise for the hotel management to close down the operations as they may have made their money by now (sic),” the letter stated.
The letter went on to say that the developers of the project had no financial difficulties as the necessary budgets had already been allocated for the project. It further charged that financial relief and concessions introduced by the Government to provide relief to industries affected by Covid-19 have also been misused by the project owners.
Subsequently, Gunaratne, issuing a media statement, clarified the status of the project. He stated that their plans were to soft launch the property from June 2020 onwards and that they have been compelled to pause these plans as a direct response to the emergency prevalent across the country and globally.
He added that operations will resume once the Government provides clearance to the hotel sector, but stopped short of specifying a tentative date of resumption.
Marriott International has over 6,500 hotel properties globally and over 1.38 million hotel rooms, and this was a Board of Investment (BOI)-approved project signed seven years ago. Lanka Hotels and Residencies (Pvt.) Ltd. and its promoters, Greenwater Resorts (Pvt.) Ltd. of India and Eurocon Building Industries FZE of the UAE together with their Sri Lankan partner, were reported to have made an investment of $ 80 million in the project.
Sheraton Colombo Hotel was set to be a 320-room property located in Colombo 3, complete with a Presidential Suite and other themed luxury suites along with a collection of four restaurant outlets. The architectural contract had been awarded to a leading global firm of architectural design consultancies, WS Atkins, who are also the designers and engineers for Burj Al Arab, The Address Downtown, Dubai Metro, and the 2012 Olympic Games in London. The interior design contract was awarded to M/s Catallo and Associates of Singapore.
A recruitment ad posted last year[/caption]
Despite the relaxation of curfew, resumption of construction projects, and reopening of hotels, an opening date for the much-hyped Sheraton Colombo Hotel is nowhere in sight.
Sheraton Colombo is a 320-room project and is part of the world’s largest hotel chain, Marriott International, Inc. It was earlier scheduled to be opened in the first half of 2020, but even to date, the developers nor Marriot have confirmed an opening date.
Other notable projects in Colombo such as Prime Grand, Marina Square, and the massive Cinnamon Life have commenced construction work recently following a standstill of over two months due to the Covid-19 curfew. All hotels in Colombo have also been reopened.
It is understood that much of the exterior construction of the project is complete and only a few minor interior developments need to be made. However, cash flow issues, mainly brought about by the Covid-19 pandemic, are said to be holding back the project and preventing the payment of salaries to employees.
The project was mired in controversy recently as a group of employees were laid off in January this year prior to the local Covid-19 outbreak. Laid off employees alleged that the management of Sheraton did not progress the construction and other preparatory work with a genuine focus to open on schedule, raising questions on whether the project has been abandoned.
However, when The Sunday Morning Business contacted Don Gamini Gunaratne, the Chairman of Lanka Hotels and Residencies (Pvt.) Ltd., the developer of the project, he assured that the project is not abandoned and confirmed that the hotel will be opened within this year.
“No one is going to spend a hundred million dollars on a project just to abandon it. The hotel will be opened even if we have cash flow issues. Those will not be an impediment for us to open the hotel,” he added.
According to Gunaratne, over 97% of Sheraton Colombo’s construction work has been completed as they earlier planned to open the hotel in June 2020, while only minor works and interior has to be built which too would be completed soon.
When asked about laid off employees, he stated that they had to be laid off mainly due to the cash flow issues created by Covid-19.
Around 100 employees of Sheraton Colombo were given letters of termination with the assurance of rehiring them after opening the hotel. The hotel is paying a 25% retainer fee monthly to all these employees.
“Employees have their own views; people who go apart will also have their own issues. But before Covid-19, salaries were being paid to everyone. Even after, they were all paid until the end of April,” he added.
Sheraton Colombo came into the limelight when the group of employees who were laid off by Sheraton wrote a letter to President Gotabaya Rajapaksa in April this year, identifying themselves as “victimised employees of Sheraton Colombo Hotel”.
The letter, which has been seen by The Sunday Morning Business, alleges that there has been large-scale financial misappropriation under the pretext of “foreign investment” by the Indian owners of M/s Lanka Hotels and Residencies (also known as Sheraton Colombo).
“We were enlisted to the Sheraton Colombo from January 2020, and the hotel was to open at the end of March 2020. However, as we have witnessed, the Indian management did not progress the construction and other preparatory work of this hotel project properly and with the genuine focus of opening the hotel by the end of March 2020. We are now compelled to think that Covid-19 situation was a blessing in disguise for the hotel management to close down the operations as they may have made their money by now (sic),” the letter stated.
The letter went on to say that the developers of the project had no financial difficulties as the necessary budgets had already been allocated for the project. It further charged that financial relief and concessions introduced by the Government to provide relief to industries affected by Covid-19 have also been misused by the project owners.
Subsequently, Gunaratne, issuing a media statement, clarified the status of the project. He stated that their plans were to soft launch the property from June 2020 onwards and that they have been compelled to pause these plans as a direct response to the emergency prevalent across the country and globally.
He added that operations will resume once the Government provides clearance to the hotel sector, but stopped short of specifying a tentative date of resumption.
Marriott International has over 6,500 hotel properties globally and over 1.38 million hotel rooms, and this was a Board of Investment (BOI)-approved project signed seven years ago. Lanka Hotels and Residencies (Pvt.) Ltd. and its promoters, Greenwater Resorts (Pvt.) Ltd. of India and Eurocon Building Industries FZE of the UAE together with their Sri Lankan partner, were reported to have made an investment of $ 80 million in the project.
Sheraton Colombo Hotel was set to be a 320-room property located in Colombo 3, complete with a Presidential Suite and other themed luxury suites along with a collection of four restaurant outlets. The architectural contract had been awarded to a leading global firm of architectural design consultancies, WS Atkins, who are also the designers and engineers for Burj Al Arab, The Address Downtown, Dubai Metro, and the 2012 Olympic Games in London. The interior design contract was awarded to M/s Catallo and Associates of Singapore.