Gatchalian to collect P1B insurance cover to rebuild Pavilion
Hotel tycoon William Gatchalian has found the money to ensure the speedy rehabilitation of his fire-damaged Manila Pavilion.
According to the hotel’s latest financial report, the “current assets increased from P243.75 million as of Dec. 31, 2017 to P1.19 billion as of second quarter 2018 due to receivable from insurance claim.”
That means the Manila Pavilion expects to receive about P950 million in indemnity for the March 18 fire that hit the lower floors and the former casino area of the 22-story hotel.
Gatchalian’s son, Manila Pavilion president Kenneth Gatchalian, did not identify the insurance company other than reporting that the hotel had forked out P7.8 million in premium payments last year to cover such calamities.
The Bureau of Fire Protection has already paved the way for the Pavilion filing the claim, issuing a certification a month after, on April 23 to be exact, that the blaze that hit the 50-year-old structure had been “accidental in nature.”
Gatchalian was apparently confident that the Pavilion could not only collect the insurance indemnity, but also reopen the hotel before Christmas since the clearance that the Pavilion management had sought from the labor department for the “temporary” layoff of the hotel’s 225 employees was good only up to Nov. 24 this year.
Even before the fire, the hotel management had already budgeted P350 million to renovate the building, courtesy of a P1.7 billion loan extended last year by Philippine Bank of Communications which will also fund the renovations of the sister Waterfront hotels in Cebu and Davao.
According to Gatchalian, the Manila Pavilion redevelopment includes the reduction of the existing 502 rooms to only 493, as more rooms will be configured into suites.
As well, a “fully modernized swimming pool and recreation floor, and exciting new dining outlets within a fully-redesigned casino area” will also be built, the young Gatchalian reported.
Despite suing Pagcor, the Manila Pavilion lost the casino business to its new neighbor, Rizal Park Hotel (the former Army Navy Club), and was unable to stop the state-owned gaming regulator and the new kid on the block from opening the gambling establishment, with the Pavilion’s petition for certiorari still pending before the Court of Appeals.
Unlike the 10-year contract that Pavilion had previously obtained, Rizal Park Hotel was awarded by Pagcor a 15-year gaming contract through Vanderwood Management Corp., whose president is listed as one Manuel Sy, to operate the new casino.
The loss of the casino operations immediately burned a hole through Pavilion’s pockets. “Because Pagcor surrendered the portion of the lease area for renovations,” revenues for 2017 dropped by 25 percent, the hotel said.
Manila Pavilion also reported a net loss of nearly P44 million for the year even as the hotel dropped the average room rate to P2,200 a night from P2,274 in 2016.
Money talks
• Stockbroker Wilson Sy and his partners in More Minerals Corp. are seeking a franchise to establish, operate, and maintain a distribution system for the conveyance of electric power to end users in Iloilo, according to a House bill filed on More Minerals’ behalf by Parañaque Rep. Gus Tambunting.
• The daughter of insurance magnate Peter Coyiuto and real estate heiress Elena Tanyu, Samantha, who embarked on a media career in New York this year, has been gifted by her doting parents with a two-bedroom, 2.5-bath, 157-square-meter condo unit at the Madison Square Park neighborhood.
According to Douglas Elliman property company, the common charges (association dues) for the unit alone costs $2,123 a month, aside from the $3,291 in taxes that the Coyiutos will have to fork out also every month.
A former columnist for The Philippine STAR’s Young Star section, Samantha has just finished a master of fine arts creative writing degree at The New School.
Heard through the grapevine
A move in Congress to grant Filipino citizenship to Philippine-born Spanish national Margarita Melian Ortigas, wife of lawyer Ignacio Ortigas of the Greenhills-Ortigas landholding fortune, has been started, with Oriental Mindoro Rep.Doy Leachon filing the appropriate bill.