A GLOBAL ICON

The Hilton Hotel has opened in Port Moresby.

The long-awaited Port Moresby Hilton opened for business in late 2018, in time for the APEC meetings. It is only the second global chain-branded hotel in PNG. It has 212 rooms and 46 suites.

Together with the distinctive adjacent Kutubu Convention Centre, it is the first part of the Star Mountain Plaza project, a joint venture between the government and three major provincial landowner companies: Petroleum Resources Kutubu Limited, Mineral Resource Star Mountain and Mineral Resource Ok Tedi. It is under the trusteeship of state-owned Mineral Resource Development Company (MRDC).

‘Being able to say that a company like Hilton is investing in the region is a key story for the country,‘ says the hotel’s General Manager John Lucas. He says that, in keeping with the theme of trying to support the local work force, expat numbers have been kept low.

‘I had no expectations when I started; I was employee number one. I put a fairly innocent posting on what was not even a Hilton web site; it was a Star Mountain Plaza web site. I got swamped. I have never seen anything like it. They are all good capable and qualified people willing to work—or happy to just come along and learn the ropes.’