I CANNOT IMAGINE the Hong Kong Monetary Authority being all that pleased by Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa's description on Sunday of IFC2, its future offices and Hong Kong's tallest building.
To the crowds at a groundbreaking ceremony at the Disney Park, Mr Tung said: 'I look forward to seeing all of you again, ladies and gentlemen, on this very same piece of land with Sleeping Beauty Castle towering in the background. . .'
Very apt, Mr Tung. I do not know about Beauty but sleeping certainly describes what the HKMA was doing when it decided to go there. The HK$3.7 billion it paid for its 14 floors is twice the going rate for Grade A office property and more than your equity subscription to Disney Park.
And, talking of sleeping on the job, I have some questions relating to that about Disney as well, not that I would call your chief representative in those negotiations a beauty either, not with that haircut he sports, much as you favour the bogbrush appearance.
As I understand it, the original Phase One of this development was to extend up to 2020, with 5.2 million visitors expected in 2005, the year of opening, and this number rising to 10 million visitors by 2020, when a second phase might commence. I now hear and see reports of a second phase as early as 2012 with the attendance goal of 10 million visitors also shifted forward to 2012.
There is nothing wrong with this. Back when the deal was announced there was no way of knowing that visitor arrivals to Hong Kong, which were running at 11.2 million a year, would rise to 16.5 million three years later.
But it brings the arrangements for a second phase all that much closer to the spotlight. The original briefing paper states that Hong Kong International Theme Parks, the joint venture with Disney, has an option for 20 years after the park opens to purchase the Phase Two site for HK$2.812 billion, subject to adjustments for inflation.