PESHAWAR: A company building Malam Jabba tourist resort in Swat valley has resorted to an unusual way to remind the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government of its contractual obligations. The company is running an advertisement campaign in national dailies.

The advertisement appearing in newspapers for more than a month now is demanding of the provincial government to build Malam Jabba Road and provide water and electricity so that the company could complete its work and inaugurate the tourist resort in time.

It is pertinent to mention that Malam Jabba resort, developed by PTDC, was attacked and damaged by militants in 2008. Once normalcy was regained, the government decided to attract investors and advertised in March, 2014 for a 33-year lease and access rights extendable for another 20 years, for the land measuring 275 acres in Malam Jabba.

The Samsons Group of Companies (Group) was awarded the resort project. The agreement was signed on September 4, 2014, between the provincial government and the Group.

Company building Malam Jabba resort seeks construction of road

Out of the 275 acres, five acres were dedicated to construction of a five-star hotel while access rights to 270 acres were given for construction of chairlift and ancillary facility.

“As per timelines defined in our contract we have, with many hardships, been able to fulfil our obligations timely. As the resort nears completion and is expected to be opened soon, we want the KP government to provide us with all the required facilities already committed in the contract,” said a representative of the Group.

“The Group had to resort to media publications just to remind the government its obligations, which till date continue to be unfulfilled,” said Umar Farooq, the representative of the Group.

He said that under section 16 of the agreement, the government promised to widen and pave the road leading to the resort, provide electricity and ensure availability of water.

The officials of KP government, on the other hand, said that they were aware of the funding issues as ADP did not provide sufficient funds to complete building Malam Jabba Road in one go. The ADP scheme of 35 kilometres Manglawar to Malam Jabba road with approved cost of Rs1.300 billion had merely an allocation of Rs10.00 million in the current year.

Moreover, they said, since May 2016 work had been stopped as the previous contractor violated the contract. However, they said that they found a way to fund building of the road.

“To keep our word given to Samson Group, full financing for the project was needed during the current financial year so we devised a business model to arrange loan from Bank of Khyber and repay the loan in next five years with toll revenue of the road leading to the resort,” said an official.

He said that representatives of Bank of Khyber agreed to advance a loan amount of Rs1.600 billion at a markup rate of 9 per cent with a payback period of five years equal installments.

So far Samsons Group has erected the chairlift facility, 640 metres long having 103 cable carts, which was formally inaugurated on September 1, 2016 by PTI chairman Imran Khan and Chief Minister Pervez Khattak.

Right across the chairlift, the Group is developing a five-star hotel featuring huge conference rooms, spa and fitness centre, banquet halls and variety of restaurants.

This resort will offer a mix of summer and winter sports and recreational activities. Apart from this chairlift, there would be provision for skating, skiing, hiking, mini golf course, horse riding, archery, paragliding, zip line, snowboarding and many more recreational facilities in the scope of this resort.

The planned roof top restaurants and pent house suites would offer a beautiful view of the picturesque mountains in a luxurious setting.

The consultant architect for the hotel is Nayyar Ali Dada and Associates, who won world wide honours in raising Serena Hotel in Islamabad.

Published in Dawn, August 8th, 2017