The planned property mix Phoenix in Nha Trang. File photo
Investment authorities in Khanh Hoa are asking the local government to cancel a controversial mega beach project after the investor failed to prove it can raise the required money.
Tran Minh Hai, deputy director of the province environment department, said his department has asked the province to revoke the license issued to Indian-owned International Dewan Vietnam for the Phoenix project on Nha Trang beach.
The licensing conditions required Dewan to bring in registered capital of VND420 billion (US$19.26 million) for the $1.2 billion project by the end of June, which the company failed to do.
Dewan first planned a mixed development of more than 70 hectares including a hotel, an apartment building of 65 stories, a boardwalk and an entertainment complex, which it said would be “rebuilding Nha Trang” by stretching over 4.3 kilometers of the popular beach.
But the province last May scaled the project down to the apartment building and the hotel on 14 hectares after the media reported opposition from residents, architects, and some former officials.
The critics said the province was privatizing the beach and offering it exclusively to those with money.
