The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

The Port Department’s acting controller yesterday confirmed that the arrest of Crystal Cruises’ two vessels comes at “absolutely no cost to The Bahamas’ government”.

Senior Commander Berne Wright, who as admiralty marshall is responsible for detaining and securing both the Crystal Serenity and Crystal Symphony, told Tribune Business that the detentions will not further burden already hard-pressed Bahamian taxpayers.

Tribune Business sources said the attorneys who obtained the Supreme Court order authorising the vessels’ arrest, in this case Callenders & Co, have to give an undertaking that they will cover all the admiralty marshall’s costs until the ships involved are either released or sold to repay creditors what they are owed.

Attorneys in such cases usually obtain a guarantee, or indemnity, from the creditor client that the latter will cover any bills incurred. However, this newspaper understands that many Bahamian attorneys were reluctant to accept the Crystal Cruises assignment because of the complexities involving the bankruptcy of its Hong Kong parent company.

“This is a perfect storm,” one source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said. “You have the bankruptcy in Hong Kong, court proceedings in the US, and the vessels arrested in The Bahamas. The jurisprudence of this is going to be interesting. This is not a run of the mill arrest.”

Commander Wright, meanwhile, acknowledged that the costs associated with the two cruise ships’ arrest could be significant and extend to the millions of dollars if the situation remains unresolved for some time.

“There’s absolutely no cost to The Bahamas’ government,” he said, adding that every commercial vessel should also possess insurance to cover situations such as this. “There’s no timeline for how long they will be under arrest. It all depends on whether they’re able to settle the debt or the court orders the vessels to be sold.

“Right now our obligation is to control and secure the ship, and to have the crew repatriated. It could go from a couple of days to couple of weeks, but we’re not certain of the timeline.”

Confirming that both Crystal vessels are “in the anchorage just outside the harbour” in Freeport, Commander Wright added: “There’s private security on board and all the ships’ documents have been secured. They are really no good without those documents; they can’t travel anywhere without those documents.... all the certifications.”

He was also waiting on “a precise figure” for how many crew will have to be left on both vessels to maintain them, something known as “the safe manning requirement”, which is determined by the cruise ships’ “character and capacity”. That will determine how many of the 900 total crew will be repatriated, with “small numbers” already leaving the ships to head to their home countries.

Commander Wright said that, while both Crystal ships already have a port/shipping agent to take care of their food provisioning and fuel needs, it is uncertain who will be paying them. Genting, the conglomerate that owns Resorts World Bimini, is the ultimate owner, while Peninsula Petroleum is the fuel supplier that moved for their arrest.

Jobeth Coleby-Davis, minister for transport and housing, said of the cruise ships’ arrest: “What happened is the owners of the ship had a warrant that was issued in the US, and they came into our jurisdiction because they’re registered as a flag ship under the Bahamas Maritime Authority. As a result, they have that right to come here.

“Now, it’s a delicate balance that has to be placed because they are one of our registered ships. All of their certifications are still in good standing, their insurance has to be in good standing, and so we have to balance BMA’s relationship with our ships as well as warrants that are placed on assets. The ship is an asset of the actual owner. And the assets have been seized in the US.

“We, through the Supreme Court here, issued a writ for the ships to be arrested here because of the existing warrant in the US, and so then they assigned an admiralty marshall, who is our port controller, Berne Wright, who went and assisted with the arrest of the ship due to the fact that the warrant exists in the US in that jurisdiction. So that’s what’s happened there.”

This is a “normal procedure,” she added. Crystal Cruises has another ship that has been arrested in Argentina, and Mrs Coleby-Davis said: “So it’s nothing unusual that has happened. It’s just a process that we have to go through, and then we have to make sure that we’re in alignment with the issuance of warrants.”

Chester Cooper, deputy prime minister and minister of tourism, investments and aviation, wished Crystal Cruises well as it had been a “good partner”. He voiced hope that its financial troubles is a will be resolved soon.

“The matter with Crystal Cruises is a commercial matter I believe that the attorney general has spoken to it or will speak to it,” he added. “But from a tourism perspective, Crystal Cruises has been a good partner.

“They had implemented home porting and traveling around the islands of The Bahamas. That product was well received with reasonable degrees of successes in some of the islands, and we wish them well.

Mr Cooper continued: “The numbers that they brought were relatively low in comparison to the five million pre-pandemic cruise visitors that we received. So we don’t expect a significant impact in the number of visitors as a result of their departure.

“However, we want them to do well and they’re having some financial issues clearly at the parent level. They’re practically out of business, and it’s a commercial matter between them and the people they owe. We wish them well for the future.”