THOSE who were hoping to cash in on the woes of Century City, which has not yet delivered the returns it promised, can think again.

Its new head, Greg Deans, has a long-term mandate.

'We have no intention of undercutting the value of assets under the guise of a speedy exit strategy,' says Deans.

The fact Deans was deployed by a bank NedcorBoE for this position may have suggested he was sent in to dispose of Century City as a noncore asset to the group. Before Nedbank bought BoE, the latter said it was working on a way to exit its noncore assets, especially Century City.

Deans says while he is serving a bank, he is a fully fledged property developer, not a banker. The property fraternity harbours a deep mistrust of bankers, believing they are not well suited to manage assets such as Century City because they want to make a fast buck, whereas property investment requires a long-term view.

Sources close to Century City say the development's woes were made worse by the pressure from BoE exerted on previous management.

Deans has served as regional GM of BoE Corporate Property Finance Cape for the past two years.

He ran his own development company in Gauteng after working as a contract surveyor and turnkey project contract manager.

He joined NBS Devco Transvaal as regional director in 1994, becoming MD in 1996.

Devco later became BoE Property Ventures.

Deans will be helped by a new management team.

Cracks in the original management team, which was operating under listed company Monex, surfaced last year with the departure of Monex CEO Martin Wragge.

Wragge's resignation was followed by BoE's offer to Monex minorities and the delisting of Monex from the JSE Securities Exchange SA early this year. Investigations were followed by a purge of the remnants of Wragge's executive management team.

Deans now has the mammoth task of selling Century City's sizeable land holdings and guiding theme park, Ratanga Junction, to profitability. Century City was launched with development rights on 500000m² of land. Less than 200000m² has been used so far, about 150000m² of it has been gobbled up by regional shopping centre Canal Walk.

Deans is to oversee the sale of the remaining 300000m², plus more land that will be available following an application for development rights covering a further 500000m².

Deans reckons new land sales will hinge on the state of the economy.

Century City was designed as a mixed-use development, with its land usage allocated to a variety of activities including retail, office and residential developments. Retail and offices have taken off; the first residential development plan was announced last week.

The R220m upmarket residential project is to be developed by Cape Town-based developer Two Oceans Development Company.

It will offer 400 units in nine separate blocks.

Construction of the first block of flats, with 48 two- and three-bedroom units, is scheduled to begin in January.