D URING the next 18 months, Siem Reap will likely be getting an explosion of new hotel
rooms if the government signs two more hotel contracts as expected next week.
Minister of Tourism Veng Sereyvuth said he expects contracts with Le Meridien and
Four Seasons to be formally announced Nov 7 along with the unveiling of a master
plan for tourism in Siem Reap and a sound and light project.
"We are moving. Everything is on the move," said Veng.
He said Le Meridien was interested in building a 200 room hotel in an initial phase,
with the possibility of expansion to 400 rooms later on. The size of the Four Seasons
project was not disclosed. "The negotiations are not yet finished," said
a spokesman for the Ministry of Tourism.
In addition, Accor Asia -Pacific, the operator of the Sofitel Cambodiana in Phnom
Penh, also has plans for a $15 million hotel in Siem Reap with 150 rooms. That deal
has been made with a private landowner and thus doesnít require a government
contract, according to the tourism official.
Neither of the two hotels under discussion will be located within the new hotel zone
recently established in Siem Reap. Both Le Meridien and Four Seasons are looking
at sites near the famed Grand Hotel díAngkor, which is to be renovated by
Raffles International. The hotel zone is located a few kilometers away from Siem
Reap's downtown.
If all the hotels now being talked about are built, Siem Reapís hotel space
would about double by the end of 1987. Some say itís a gamble whether tourism
can keep pace. Siem Reap now has about 600 hotel rooms, plus a couple hundred informal
guest house rooms, and gets abou
But as Veng Sereyvuth put it, the government believes that "it's a question
of expanding as much as you can."
