The ship, now a mockery of what it was when it was received, has its once-white paint fading into dirty-cream, while its lower part has started to rust away. Most of the windows on the yacht are broken, letting in the elements. An attempt to cover the damaged windows with polymer has been inadequate. Large chunks of the material have been torn to shreds by the lagoon’s brisk breeze. Despite the colourful celebration that heralded arrival of the yacht, the hotel has not operated since it berthed.
In 2009, when the former Commissioner for Tourism and Inter-Governmental Relations, Senator Tokunbo Afikuyomi led a delegation of Lagos State Government to welcome the yacht to Lagos, he said the floating hotel was the first of its kind in Africa adding that it would put the state and Nigeria in particular in the league of the first five major cities of the world with similar hospitable facilities and tourism earnings capabilities.
Hopes of Lagosians were high that time as they believed the hotel would rejuvenate the tourism sector in the state. Then, Senator Afikuyomi claimed that the hotel will put Lagos on the same pedestal as major tourist destinations like Paris, New York, Barcelona, and Helsinki. He described the transfer of the hotel from the United Kingdom to Lagos as a significant achievement for the administration of Babatunde Fashola and everybody present at the occasion clapped for the Senator and the government.
Weekly Trust recalled that Afikuyomi boasted that winning the bid for the yacht, over the cities of Dubai and Doha, is a reflection of the seriousness of Fashola’s administration to set the pace for others to following this part of the world, in the tourism industry. Instead, the multi-billion naira property has become a source of controversy, accusations and denial while the hotel which won the Best Hotel award in the Food and Drink category in the United Kingdom for 2005 and 2006 is suffering.
But Lagos State government has denied investing in the controversial hotel. Senator Tokunbo who, as a serving commissioner in Lagos who was around in the United Kingdom as a representative of the government before the departure of the Sunborn Yacht in London and readily available to receive the vessel in Lagos has turned round to deny the state’s ownership of the property.
Afikuyomi’s stand before he bowed out of office a couple of months ago is that the state government’s involvement in the purchase of the yacht is limited to just facilitate the deal and provision of land for the onshore facilities.
Then ex-Commissioner for Information and Strategy, Barrister Opeyemi Bamidele, before he resigned his appointment from Fashola’s administration earlier in the year, said: “The Sunborn Yacht does not belong to the state. We were not involved in any way beyond providing an enabling environment for the yacht’s arrival.”
But findings revealed that Afikuyomi is involved deeper in the controversial property than what he is making public. It was reliably gathered that he participated actively in the purchase, transportation and the welcome ceremony for the vessel.
According a top official of Multi-Purpose Infrastructural Development Company (MIDC), the company that facilitated the yacht deal, Lagos State Government became interested when the London Hotel management was proposing to build a replacement vessel. The official, who pleaded for anonymity due to the fact that there was a court case on the abandoned hotel, explained that Afikuyomi negotiated for ‘everything’ from purchase to arrival in Lagos.
Investigations shows that Afikuyomi succeeded in joining the state government with Diamond bank, (a Lagos-based commercial bank), Lone Seed Limited, a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV), representing Diamond Capital Ltd; Financial advisers and lead arrangers, M.I.D.C Ltd and the Lagos State Ministry of Tourism under Private Public Partnership (PPP) and acquired the floating hotel at a cost of 22 million Euros.
At present, the Lagos Sunborn Hotel is subject of a lawsuit no. FHC/L/ CS/1099/09 at the Federal High Court, Lagos where Loneseed Nig. Ltd. instituted a legal tussle with the state government for ownership of the Yacht. The dispute in the suit arose essentially from a loan transaction for the acquisition of the Sunborn Yacht Hotel with Diamond Capital & Financial Market Ltd, a wholly owned subsidiary of Diamond Bank Plc, who amongst others are defendants in the counter claim filed in the said suit by MIDC, against Loneseed Nigeria Ltd. As a result of this pending lawsuit, none of the mentioned parties involved in the hotel’s acquisition could make remarks.
Designed by Lasse Heikkinen, a Finnish ship architectural company, the Sunborn was bought from its former owners Sunborn International, Finland. Before it was brought to Lagos, the yacht was reportedly taken to Brazil for refurbishing for an undisclosed amount. From the information available, the yacht was one of the iconic features of the London hospitality industry. Popularly referred to as the “Pride of London”, it is the world’s first custom-built yacht hotel.
The Sunborn Yacht Hotel was a major tourist attraction in London. A night in the floating hotel for a single room came with a starting price of £300 approximately N75, 000. Estimated to cost about N4.4 billion, the floating hotel has 105 suites. The rusting edifice, with a total of six decks and an interior space of approximately 5000 sq.metre, provides a breathtaking ambience for corporate guests, conference delegates, wedding parties and leisure guests to hold their exclusive events.
