{"id":365798,"date":"2022-04-06T06:01:24","date_gmt":"2022-04-05T20:01:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=365798"},"modified":"2022-04-06T06:01:24","modified_gmt":"2022-04-05T20:01:24","slug":"ccc-chair-deleon-guerrero-says-hes-tired-of-ipis-runaround","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/ccc-chair-deleon-guerrero-says-hes-tired-of-ipis-runaround\/","title":{"rendered":"CCC chair DeLeon Guerrero says he\u2019s tired of IPI\u2019s runaround"},"content":{"rendered":"
Tao Xing, Imperial Pacific International (CNMI) LLC senior vice president for marketing and public affairs, talks about, among other things, IPI\u2019s request for a five-year extension to complete their Imperial Pacific Resort project in western Garapan, during the Commonwealth Casino Commission board\u2019s monthly meeting Wednesday at the Springs Plaza in Gualo Rai. (FERDIE DE LA TORRE)
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Commonwealth Casino Commission board chair Edward C. DeLeon Guerrero does not understand why Imperial Pacific International (CNMI) LLC is asking for five more years to complete its Imperial Pacific Resort in western Garapan, yet it has not provided information on how much more it would cost to finish the project and where they will get the money for it.<\/p>\n

He pointed out during the CCC board\u2019s monthly meeting Wednesday last week that IPI has already failed to finish the project by February 2021\u2014as required under amendment No. 6 of the casino license agreement. DeLeon Guerrero said IPI has already violated the CLA and is asking the CNMI government to grant them another extension. Yet IPI does not know how much money really would cost them to finish the project and does not know where they are going to get the money from, he added.<\/p>\n

DeLeon Guerrero made the comments after listening to Tao Xing, IPI\u2019s senior vice president for marketing and public affairs, who discussed during the meeting about his follow-up last March 24 with the Commonwealth Lottery Commission about their request for an extension. Xing disclosed that he inquired from the Lottery Commission on the timetable to review and the approval process for their request.<\/p>\n

At that point, But DeLeon Guerrero interrupted. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m sorry sir, maybe it\u2019s me. I don\u2019t understand anything what you\u2019re just saying,\u201d the chairman said, adding that he just does not understand what process Xing was talking about. <\/p>\n

DeLeon Guerrero said they\u2019re going in circles every monthly meeting so he advised Xing to let IPI\u2019s parent company know that CCC is tired of this runaround. The chairman said he does not understand what the Lottery Commission is going to act on when IPI is already past due with the deadline.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe should be talking about punitive damages,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Even if the Lottery Commission will deny or approve the request, what will IPI do next since they have no construction team, DeLeon Guerrero asked. \u201cI have a hard time understanding how a multi-billion dollar company will be thinking that way. Is it just me or am I missing something in here?\u201d he asked.<\/p>\n

Xing said he will convey DeLeon Guerrero\u2019s concerns but, based on his understanding, they initially requested for the extension at the beginning of last year.<\/p>\n

\u201cHad we done an estimate and put together a package, it [would be] already outdated by now. So right now we\u2019re really looking for a schedule, our review schedule and approval schedule so that we can quickly put together a team,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

DeLeon Guerrero said Xing appears not to know anything about any new revenue source or revenue stream to help IPI finish the project. When asked about the $250-million loan from a Japanese institution that IPI was supposed to secure, Xing said he has no news about that loan.<\/p>\n

At the start of the CCC board meeting, DeLeon Guerrero asked if IPI has identified a funding source for its extension request. Xing said they don\u2019t have the details yet because all they have right now is a skeleton team just keep the operations going. He said once they have the detailed information if requested by the Lottery Commission, they will probably have to put together a construction team and get some experts.<\/p>\n

DeLeon Guerrero said Xing is requesting to extend a construction deadline that is already gone and has passed. \u201cYou, IPI, should have an idea as to how much it costs to finish the project,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

DeLeon Guerrero said the last information they received from Xing was that there is an individual coming in from Macau, China, or Hong Kong that will conduct valuation and update valuation of property. The chairman asked if that has occurred.<\/p>\n

Xing replied they\u2019re trying to do it virtually, but that\u2019s really tied to the audit process. <\/p>\n

Xing said they really need to have some kind of experts to validate as \u201cthe range is pretty wide.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said the estimate partially depends on when the Lottery Commission start the approval process. <\/p>\n

Xing said the lower end estimate to complete the project is about $50 million and the higher end is $250 million. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt really tied to our marketing strategy going forward. Given the whole\u2026market dynamic changes, we\u2019ll probably have to reevaluate what\u2019s the target market for us, that will come down to how we\u2019re going to finish the interior,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

DeLeon Guerrero asked how the Lottery Commission could make a decision when Xing or IPI has no idea how much it would cost and where to get the money. <\/p>\n

Xing said that, based on his experience, it takes about six months to pull all the information together to validate and revalidate, then present it to the Lottery Commission. Xing said they are waiting for exactly what kind of information or material the Lottery Commission needs. <\/p>\n

He said once the approval process starts for the extension of the deadline, they probably have to pull some people from off island from U.S. or China to finalize the estimation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Commonwealth Casino Commission board chair Edward C. DeLeon Guerrero does not understand why Imperial Pacific…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":23,"featured_media":365800,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[12497],"class_list":["post-365798","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-local-news","tag-ipi"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365798","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/23"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=365798"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/365798\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/365800"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=365798"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=365798"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=365798"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}