Bridgetown, the emerging tourism outfit geared to connect its visitors to three other countries bordering Botswana in the north, is aiming to open its subscription to retail investors thanks to its ensuing partnership with Barclays Bank.
Bridgetown owns a piece of land of six-and ÔÇôhalf hectors strike length along the banks of the Chobe riverÔÇöin the resort town of Kasane ÔÇöthat has been visited by world renowned celebrities such as former U.S President, Bill Clinton and Elizabeth Taylor due to the by beauty of wilderness and Safari.
“The first face of the project is scheduled for completion by September next year and that will entail 20 cabana units. It is going to be prestine and beautiful,” Collin Willis, project manager of the multi-million pula Bridgetown said.
“We are really going to make it an up market project,” he added.
The project will at its completion boost of 92 cabana units entailing — 74 double storey buildings and 17 single unitsÔÇöalong perennial Chobe river that starts from Angola cutting across Namibia, Botswana and Zimbabwe before offloading into Mozambique and the Indian Ocean.
The Bridgetown project provides Batswana to own holiday houses in one of the country’s most popular tourist attraction destination after the Okavango Delta.
The Bridgetown project seeks to bring to the ordinary citizen of Botswana an opportunity to buy into an affordable lifetime holiday destination.
A place where one can relax, share the natural beauty of the Botswana wilderness, experience our heritage, and own a piece of history.
The apartment will be sectional titled and thereafter further subdivided into single undivided shares. These shares will then be made available to the public for sale and purchase through a variety of affordable financial packages designed to allow Batswana the opportunity to participate in the project.
They can either go for an outright purchase at P 2.5 million and have an option of keeping the keys or enter through a P 55,000 subscription that will most likely see their property managed under the pool arrangement.
Under the pool arrangement the property will be given to a professional property management company that will among other thing liasing with international tourism marketing companies for bookings and in turn investors will share the profits at the end of the financial year.
Located near where the Kazungula bridge is to be erected Bridgetown is bound to give its visitors arear opportunity in term of tourism experience in Botswana. It will easily connect people with Victoria Falls ÔÇô either on the Zambian or Zimbabwean side and at the same time offer some boat drives to Katima Mulilo on the Namibian side.
“We have been in negotiations with tour operators on the Zimbabwean side and they are keen to have our guest to go there and have an experience of what they offer during the day. Hence, we will immediately introduce a shuttle between Bridgetown and Livingstone on the Zambian side,” Patrick Balopi head of Bridgetown said.
Further, Bridgetown is expected to offer an assortment of activities leisure including amusement park, restaurant, boat houses and a deck —- for those who own small boats and those interested in taking some boat drives along the Chobe river.
The company has purchased some farms that are going to be turned into some game park where guest will be entertained with night game drives and bush braai.
The development are expected to be part of the larger picture which Kasane is planning to undertake with the building of the Kazungula bridge that is aimed at bolstering trade and commerce across the Southern African Development Community ( SADC) region and the expansion of the Airport.
The resort town has the potential of linking with some of the regional capitals such as Livingstone, Harare, Johannesburg and Cape Town through air in a bid to strengthen position within the region.
So far, it has links with Lusaka following the decision of Air Botswana to fly Gaborone- Lusaka through the resort town.
