cameroon Off-Shore Betting

Africa’s first big off-shore banking haven is set to be built in Cameroon, and it’ll be accompanied by the nation’s third 18-hole golf course.

Emerald Coast Financial & Tourism Free Zone will take shape on 777 acres, including more than a mile’s worth of beachfront, just outside the coastal town of Limbe. It’ll have its own immigration and customs control center, its own port, and its own airport receiving center for VIPs, not to mention an “ultra-secure underground vault,” to be built into the side of a nearby mountain, “for the safe-keeping of hard assets such as bullion and other valuables.”

No doubt, some very high-rollers will be among the foursomes on its golf course.

Cameroon’s government has issued a license to build Emerald Coast to GCN Canada, Inc., a group based in a suburb of Ottawa, and Bonanza Estates S.A., an entity based in Limbe.

Robert Sabga, a former high commissioner for the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago and the principal of GCN Canada, said in a press release that Emerald Coast will combine “the benefits of a financial tax haven with the attraction of an ultra-exclusive, resort-style, duty-free zone.” He called it “the only such destination of its kind in the world.”

An Egyptian company, Hiram Estates Investments, has agreed to put up $850 million in financing for the first phase of the project, which will include a duty-free shopping mall, an entertainment center with a casino, a business and financial center, a marina that can accommodate mega-yachts, a boardwalk, and a hotel with 250 conventional rooms and 200 “luxury” condos.

The financing for the subsequent phases of Emerald Coast hasn’t yet been secured, but the zone has been planned to include upscale villas and apartments, time-share condos, several resort-style hotels, an arts and entertainment center, a convention center, a medical center, restaurants operated by “international chefs,” and a “world-class” golf course.

“The Emerald Coast project is going to fundamentally alter the way the rest of the world looks at Africa,” Sabga said in a press release. “It is going to change the continent of Africa as never before.”

As best I can determine, Cameroon currently has just two 18-hole golf courses, Likomba Golf Club in Tiko and Mont Febe Hotel Golf Course in Yaoundé, the nation’s capital. There’s also a golf course in Kribi, but I can’t tell if it has nine or 18 holes.