Akihabara News (Tokyo) — Wakayama Governor Yoshinobu Nisaka has vowed to use a future opportunity to revive his prefecture’s bid to host an Integrated Resort (IR) including a casino at the Marina City location, in spite of the “bitter blow” he received this month when the Wakayama Prefectural Assembly shot down his plan.
“We are not able to proceed with this project,” Nisaka conceded at a press conference this week, “but considering Wakayama’s potential, there is no need to give up on the fundamental idea of hosting an Integrated Resort.”
He added, “The majority of those in the prefectural assembly who voted against it are actually pro-IR. They disagreed with this specific project, but they say there could be another scenario. If we can find a better plan, I’d like to make it happen.”
In a similar manner, Clairvest Neem Ventures also conceded defeat in an open letter to the people of Wakayama published this week, but also indicated that they intended to try again.
“We will continue to explore the possibilities of IR development in Japan,” the letter stated. The company will close its Wakayama office, but keep the Tokyo office open.
Clairvest Neem Ventures went on to try to re-litigate the recently lost battle, claiming that they had been misunderstood.
“We are convinced that the current certainty is 100% for financing the Wakayama IR, but perhaps because of our lack of explanation, we have not been able to obtain understanding of this fact. We feel regret that we have come to this result.”
They argued once again that the commitments which they had secured for the project were fully consistent with the global standard for such matters.
Barring a major revision of national policy, neither Wakayama nor Clairvest will get another shot for about seven years. However, many observers think that the government will indeed revise the national plan in light of the fact that so much has gone wrong in the first round of bidding.
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