By Bob Kernohan

The chief executive of one of the world‘s largest hotel groups gave his seal of approval yesterday to a R320-million development on Port Elizabeth‘s beachfront.

Kurt Ritter, president and chief executive officer of the Rezidor Hotel Group, was on his first trip to Port Elizabeth to visit the site of the 14-floor, five-star Radisson Hotel being built by city entrepreneur Ben Nyaumwe. The hotel is scheduled to open in December.

Rezidor, which is based in Belgium, controls a chain of 323 hotels under the brand names Radisson, Carlson, Park Inn and Regent. It employs more than 25 000 staff and has 66 000 rooms in 48 countries, mainly in Europe.

However, Ritter and fellow group executives said in Port Elizabeth the group was planning a major expansions into Africa.

Ritter said the Rezidor group was “grateful” to Nyaumwe and his Auspex Property group for having provided “the great opportunity” to manage the beachfront hotel, which will have 173 luxury rooms and internationalclass services and cuisine.

The Radisson will be the first five-star hotel in Port Elizabeth since the Elizabeth Hotel became a Holiday Inn in the early 1990s. It is being built on the corner of Ninth Avenue and Marine Drive in Summerstrand.

Ritter said it was generally accepted in Europe and the US that any city of more than a million people, like Port Elizabeth, should have at least one internationally recognised five-star hotel.

“Having this top brand is very good for Port Elizabeth as it puts it on a much higher level of client recognition as the Radisson brand is marketed internationally.

“Business people and tourists are attracted to a city which has such a well-known brand,” said Ritter, 60, who has been in the hotel industry all his working life.

He said Radisson‘s decision to manage the beachfront hotel had been motivated not by eating into the “existing cake” of hotel occupancy and use, but to make the cake bigger by catering for a new high-end market segment – “and we aim to have a big slice of that new piece”.

Ritter added that the opening of the Radisson could lead the way for other international hotels, like the Hilton and Sheraton groups, also opening as the city‘s growth continued. “We would welcome the competition.”

The group‘s specialist African business development director, Andrew McLachlan, who is based in Cape Town, said the decision to choose Port Elizabeth for a Radisson hotel was part of a Rezidor strategy to increase its footprint in Africa.

But there were also particular factors, including the planned Coega aluminium plant and related activities and the fact that the local operations of major multinational companies were becoming more important in international terms, resulting in more business people visiting the city.

On top of that, tourism was growing. “We have a Radisson in Cape Town and soon will have one in Port Elizabeth, so they complement each other as starting and finishing points for Garden Route tourists. Port Elizabeth is also the ideal base for tourists going to the Addo park and for the many top-class game lodges in the Eastern Cape.”

McLachlan said it was envisaged the new hotel would be used by business people and as a conference centre from Monday to Thursday, and would be a tourist hotel over weekends and when events like the Ironman were held.