Barbara Gayle, Staff ReporterSUPREME COURT judge Bryan Sykes yesterday set aside his order quashing the environmental permit for the Bahía Principe Hotel under construction at Pear Tree Bottom in Runaway Bay, St. Ann.
Yesterday's order gives the hotel's management the go-ahead to complete the facility.
The judge had quashed the permit on May 16 because he said certain procedures were not followed by State agencies.
After the permit was quashed, Hojapi Ltd., a subsidiary of the Piñero Group which owns the hotel, took the matter to court seeking to have the order varied . It contended that it was an affected party, and was not served by the claimants so it could be a party to the proceedings.
"The hotel owners are very pleased with the ruling today," attorney-at-law Sandra Minott-Phillips who represented Hojapi said yesterday. She described the ruling as being very good in terms of potential investments for Jamaica as the ruling would restore investors' confidence.
The judge found that the hotel was an affected party and the claimants led by Northern Jamaica Conservation Association and the Jamaica Environ-ment Trust did not serve the
hotel owners so they could be a party to the suit.
DECISION IS FAIR
Patrick Foster, Deputy Solicitor General who represented the state agencies which granted the permit said "the decision is fair and balanced and took into account additional evidence which the judge did not have when
he made the decision to quash the
permit."
In handing down his decision yesterday the judge said that he accepted the evidence from Hojapi that it would suffer hardship if the order was not quashed. He also referred to the fact that construction was 85 per cent
complete and the hotel owners had spent a minimum of US$62 million (J$4 billion).
Environmental Solutions Ltd., which undertook the environmental impact assessment (EIA), had sought to have the order varied based on the judge's criticism that the EIA was flawed. The judge said the company did not have any standing in the matter. He said, however, that based on submissions from attorney-at-law Carol Davis, who represented the company, he agreed with her that the consultants who prepared the EIA were not negligent given the short time in which the National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA) had given the company to prepare it.
The judge had granted a stay of execution of his order until June 27 and the hotel was able to continue construction during that time.
The judge ruled last month that the Natural Resources Conservation Authority (NRCA) and its successor, NEPA, had breached their own standards of consultation and failed to meet the legal standard of consultation by not circulating the marine ecology report to members of the public and the claimants. He said the failure to inform the public and the claimants had increased the possibility for the public to make incorrect conclusion about the impact of the development.
