Conajzar cancels Ciudad del Este tender

Javier Balbuena, the president of Paraguay’s gaming regulator Conajzar, has announced that the tender for a casino licence in Ciudad de Este has been indefinitely suspended.

The new tender would have seen the development of a hotel and casino on an eleven-hectare site owned by the National Administration of Navigation and Ports (ANNP), situated at the head of Puente de la Amistad, an arch bridge connecting to the Brazilian city of Foz do Iguaçu.

The move comes in the face of ongoing litigation between the ANNP and the private company, Suisse Investment Corp SA, which leased the site in 2013.

The 25-year contract was signed during the last months of the administration of president Federico Franco, but was rescinded when the country’s current president Horacio Cartes took office in April that year.

This lead Suisse Investment to seek a preliminary injunction in the courts, with legal action still ongoing.

“We approved the tender but before we were aware of the ongoing legal case facing the ANNP,” Balbuena stated, speaking to local media.

“Given this, and the report that the ANNP provided us regarding the preliminary injunction on the property in question, we have decided to suspend [the licence tender].

“At present, there are no plans to continue it, nor have we included it in our schedule of tenders for this year,” he added.