MONDAY-14TH JANUARY 2008-HOTEL WITH INTEGRATED THEME PARK PLANNED FOR KK

Hotel with integrated theme park planned for KK

KOTA KINABALU:
The company that established the newly-opened KK Box entertainment outlet at Karamunsing Complex here is planning to open up a hotel with an integrated theme park here.
Rashid Hj Kayum Khan, group.director of Kuala Lumpur-based Total Metro Group, said they are currently in discussion with the Tourism, Culture and Environment Ministry to build the ambitious project.
“We believe the tourism potential here is very great. We are still in discussion with the ministry. Once that is settled I think together we will start building this hotel in one year,” he said at a press conference after the official opening of KK Box by Tourism, Culture and Environment Minister Datuk Masidi Manjun yesterday.
Rashid, however, declined to reveal the location or the projected budget for the project, citing ‘strategic” considerations.
He noted that the Group is also planning to open up two new hotels in the city to cater to the growing number of tourist arrivals here.
“We have great confidence in the tourism industry here because the ministry has shown that it is very keen (to develop the industry),” he said.
Masidi said that there is a ready market in Kota Kinabalu to support more entertainment outlets, on top of the spending power of the growing number of foreign tourists.
“We have a large number in Kota Kinabalu that can afford to patronise entertainment outlets.
“More often then not, you have people going out to places like Kuala Lumpur to patronise entertainment outlets, but if we can provide these services in Kota Kinabalu I don’t see why they have to go out of the city,” he said.
Rashid meanwhile said that the Group expects to be able to recover its RM3.8 million investment in the KK Box outlet within six months.
“We initially set the target to recover our cost within eight months, but from the looks of things we may be able to do that in just six months.
“Prior to the official opening we had our soft opening and over the three weeks our earnings have been beyond our expectations, so we are quite confident,” he said.
Rashid said that their target demographic breakdown would include 40 percent foreign tourists and 60 percent local patrons.