A dispute between management of Barbados Cruise Terminals and the Bridgetown Port could end up in the law courts for a resolution.
This comes after management and staff of Barbados Cruise Terminals Inc. found themselves locked out of the cruise facility at the Bridgetown Port when they arrived for work yesterday.
Manager Geoffrey Roach confirmed the lockout to the Saturday Sun and said the matter was in the hands of the company’s attorneys.
This is the latest development in an ongoing dispute between the private-sector company and Barbados Port Inc., which had earlier served notice to Barbados Cruise Terminals Inc. that their contract for management and operation of the facility would not be renewed.
A top source from Barbados Port Inc. confirmed yesterday that Barbados Cruise Terminals Inc.’s lease expired in December 2017.
While the private sector company’s staff were denied access to the terminal, there were indications tenants continued to operate.
In a Sunday Sun report of January 21, chief executive officer of Barbados Port Inc., David Jean-Marie, was quoted as saying the terminal was leased to Barbados Cruise Terminals Inc in January 1994 for a ten-year period, with an option to renew for a further ten-year period that would have ended in 2013. After discussions, he added, the lease was continued for “a further period of time which has since expired”.
“We gave them notice that we would have been taking back over the terminal effective January 1 this year,” Jean-Marie had said then.
The CEO had also disclosed letters had been sent to tenants operating businesses in the terminal advising of the new tenancy arrangement with the Port.
The terminal is a facility for cruise passengers passing through the Bridgetown Port and houses duty-free shops, services and government agencies such as Customs and Immigration and Port Health. All these fell under the tenancy of Barbados Cruise Terminals Inc. through the original lease arrangement.
Over the years, the Barbados Cruise Terminals Inc. has reportedly taken in close to $10 million in levies from passengers disembarking and embarking from cruise ships at the Port.
Jean-Marie said earlier Barbados Port Inc. had a 30 per cent interest with the Barbados Cruise Terminals Inc., but “it is in our interest and we have signalled it to our board that we reconnect the management and operations of the terminal as previously obtained before 1994”. (GC)
