Hong Kong-based integrated resort developer and operator Landing International Development Ltd. broke ground on the US$1.5-billion grand scheme just hours before news about President Duterte’s clampdown broke.
Landing, which currently operates the Jeju Shinhwa World resort on South Korea’s Jeju Island, received last month a provisional permit by PAGCOR, the Philippine gambling regulator, to build an integrated resort in the Manila Bay area.
Under the terms of its license, Landing would have opened the resort, named NayonLanding, in 2022. The property would have been the fifth integrated resort in Manila’s Entertainment City, a strip of land in the city’s bay aimed to be turned into a tinier version of the legendary Las Vegas Strip. There are three operational resorts in Entertainment City at present, and a fourth one is planned to open doors in the early 2020s.
NayonLanding would have been able to commence operations in February 2022 or precisely five years after the implementation of a February 2017 provision under which Entertainment City’s casino market was given a five-year period to mature, during which no other casino resorts would be launched.
During yesterday’s groundbreaking ceremony Landing officials said that they expect their US$1.5-billion resort to attract between two and three million international visitors. The plan for the integrated resort involves the construction of hotels with a total of 1,500 rooms and suites, a casino with 155 gaming tables and 239 slot machines, water parks, a convention center, and a number of food and beverage facilities, among others.
Source: GMB / Casino News Daily
