Copos Wants to Sue the Eforie Nord City Hall

Businessman George Copos wants to sue the City Hall of the Eforie Nord resort in order to recover the losses caused by the annulment of the contract with TUI.

Copos is unhappy the dirt and the noise in the resort sent the German tourists in Bulgaria. Until now, there have been filed 15 notifications, from the Ministry of Transports, Constructions and Tourism to the Police, says the press representative of the businessman. Now responses are waited.

At the initiation of Europa Yacht Club, one month ago, the president of Ana group of companies stated that this is his last investment in tourism. "It’s a set and final decision", said the busineesman at that time.

LOSSES. The businessman believes the noise in the resort sent the tourists away. "Gheorghe Copos says that partnership between ANA HOTELS CORPORATE SHARE COMPANY and the German company TUI, the greatest tour-operator in Europe, has been annulled by the German side on the 31st of July 2004", shows the on-line edition of the "Cuget Liber" newspaper. As a result, TUI annulled the holidays of the 50,000 tourists in Western Europe that were expected to arrive in Eforie Nord. "The German company justified its decision saying that the Eforie Nord environment, affected by the noise, dirt, disorder, the spoiled infrastructure and the unpleasant smells, is unfriendly, doesn’t reach the minimal expectations of the Western Europe Tourists and, as a result, TUI has to orient the occidental tourists flux towards the resorts in Bulgaria", says the quoted source.

INDIGNATION. The Eforie Nord mayor, Ovidiu Braloiu, seemed to be angry at Copos’s initiative. "I think this is aberrance. Where would we be if every man whose businesses don’t work sues the state’s institutions? Our target is to create quality tourism for the people with average incomes. What shall we do? Put a precious stone on the streets of the resort? Mr. Copos’s investments are more likely to give results in Mamaia or Neptun, not in Eforie", replied Braloiu. The present mayor said he invested more than 12 billion lei for modernizing the areas in which the Europa Hotel and the Yachting Club are built: "I have invested more than 12-13 billion in the Titulescu Boulevard and around the dancing objectives. Therefore, the City Hall offered all the support. This is where we should also add that all the other investors which came to Eforie modernized their surroundings on their own".

JOY. Regarding the petitions made by the Rapid Bucharest FC owner, the Eforie Nord mayor said that for the time being he has problems with more than 100 people that complained at the City Hall about the great amount of controls. "We would be very happy if George Copos wouldn’t invest in tourism. Recently more than 100 people, accusers, said they were assaulted by controls ordered by him. Once there were approximately 30 control officers that visited a company. Following these actions there are other investors that made petitions", added Braloiu, who doesn’t understand why is Copos so upset taking into account that this year the occupation state of the resort has been 300%: "There has never been a time in the latest 14 years for the things to go as well. I sincerely don’t understand his demands".

INVESTMENTS

In Eforie Nord Ana Hotels owns Hotel Europa since 2001. After a 20 million U.S. dollars investment, that targeted the reconstruction and the modernizing, the hotel has been classified as a four star hotel and has been taken over with a management contract by the RIU network. The other hotel owned by the group, a three stars one, has been taken over by RIU too. This year the "Ana Aslan HEALTH SPA" investment near the RIU-Europa Hotel has been finalized and represents the greatest spa in Romania that offers treatment and aging preventing packages that are based on the concept developed by DR. Ana Aslan. A mini-harbor for yachts, which needed more than 2 million euros investments, is also there.