[?]va’s GPH Has New Owners
pp. 71-73 · Read in the full issue
It Will Be Good for Fiji Tourism [?]va’s GPH Has New Owners And A New Outlook
Little time was lost in transferring the Grand Pacific Hotel, iva, from Union Steam Ship Co. ownership to Cathay Hotels td. of Singapore, once the tender of the latter had been :cepted by the Fiji Government early in April.
MINALLY, the transfer was tom the Government (to vhich the USS Co. had sur ered the lease) to Cathay; but he Government obviously did want to be concerned with i management, and no one ;ed to close the hotel just when tourist season was beginning, physical transfer was straight Union Company to Cathay pany. took place at midnight on tiesday, April 22. In the ice, through illness, of Mr. i Hurley (GPH manager), the ng Suva manager of the USS Mr. D. A. Butler, took tem :y charge; and he handed over establishment to two high itives of the Cathay Organisa who had arrived in Suva by , few days before, e Grand Pacific Hotel is now d and managed by Cathay, igh a Fiji subsidiary which has formed and registered in e price paid by Cathay is not n, but it is believed to be in dcinity of £130,000 Fijian. As d by PIM in April, Cathay has arked about £250,000 Fijian for investment and enterprise; and
a big building programme, to modernise the existing structure, and make substantial additions, is to be commenced very soon.
Meanwhile, at our request, an pfficial of the Cathay Organisation in Singapore has supplied us with the following interesting outline of the history and character of the Cathay Organisation, which now becomes an important investor in Fiji:—
Strength of Cathay Organisation
Cathay Hotel, Ltd. (which has just purchased the Grand Pacific Hotel, Suva) is part of the Cathay Organisation, of Singapore and Malaya. This is a family business, the head of which is Mr. Loke Wan Tho, the well known ornithologist and photographer.
Mr. Loke is the son of the late Dr. Loke Yew, CMG, LLD., one of the earliest pioneers of the mining and rubber industries in Malaya, who ,left behind him an almost fabulous reputation and who, at one time, was permitted by the Government in Malaya to print his own bank notes.
The Cathay Organisation com prises a number of companies con nected with the cinema industry, and is also interested in rubber
The Grand Pacific Hofei, Suva, new plans for which are outlined below.
Yanuca Island, at Cuva, near Sigatoka, the site of one of the hotels which a new company, the Hotels of the Crown Colony of Fiji Ltd., will build. The managing director of the company, Mr. Barry Philp, announced the plans of the company (a subsidiary of an American Co.) in early April.
The Yanuca Island establishment will be a luxury resort, but will cater also for residents requiring a beach holiday by building also self-contained cottages. The island will be joined to Cuva Beach (already a popular swimming area), and to Queen's Rd. (shown centre left) by a causeway.
The other hotel which the company will build will be near Nadi Airport, at Namaka; it will cater specially for air travellers, superseding the Mocambo, now operated right at Nadi air terminal by Mr. Philp under agreement with the South Pacific Air Transport Council.
Photo: Rob Wright.
s. tin mines and property in a and Singapore, the cinema side the Organisa aperates a chain of over 60 as throughout Malaya, o, Thailand and Hongkong, dition, the Organisation pro- Chinese films at its studios mgkong, and Malay films at adios in Singapore. A sub j company handles the pro n of documentary and ad ng film-lets. headquarters of the Or ition is the famous Cathay ng in Singapore, which was ied by Lord Mountbatten as eadquarters when Singapore e-occupied in 1945.
Hotel Management
enormous 14-storey building, n strikingly modern style, the y towers over the city of pore; and, from its many s, an unsurpassed view of the ar, the island and the sur ing islands can be obtained, this building is housed the y Hotel, comprising 114 , all fully air-conditioned with ones, separate bathrooms and modern convenience. hotel dining-room provides ean food and provides music iancing nightly, to a Filipino On the floor below is the y Restaurant, known to every in Singapore as the best sc restaurant where, in Dn to Chinese dishes cooked ister cooks (brought in from
Provided g anri HnnS cabaret is dancing takes place
t 0 a separate Filipino band.
Cathay Building also houses the Cathay Cinema, and contains shops, a hairdressing salon for ladies and gentlemen, and two squash courts.
OiSnS2?fS? n th 8 h(^ tel, OrSn c f ope^ at ? s he Hotel, situated six miles *'“ e cen tre 9f Singapore, in a of . s° me Slx acres, situated right on the sea coast, with its own private beach. This hotel provides da mv^ g^ Vory ni ® t - . . .
This year, another hotel, owned by the Organisation, has been opened at Jesselton (the capital of North Borneo) under the name of Borneo Hotel. This hotel was taken over by the Borneo Government in
connection with the visit to Borneo of the Duke of Edinburgh in February last.
The Suva venture is the Or ganisation’s first outside the immediate vicinity of Singapore, it is intended that a new com pany’ a subsidiary of the Cathay Organisation, shall be formed, and two of the Directors of the com pany are proceeding to Suva to arrange details. These are Mrs.
Loke Yew, the mother of Mr. Loke Wan Tho, who has taken a very prominent part in the furnishing and decoration of the Cathay Hotel, and Mr. Lien Ying Chow, who is connected with a large number of business and baking corporations in Singapore and Malaya.