Probably the most fucked up "luxury" marina in the world
On such a voyage around the world on your own keel you can experience many superlatives. For example the most fucked up "luxury" marina in the world. But first things first. Since we now had to leave Malaysia for visa reasons, we sailed to the filthy rich but also filthy boring Sultanate of Brunei. Well actually not that boring for us, since we were arrested in handcuffs 4 years ago at a police station for "arms smuggling". (You can find the whole crazy story here in the logbook under December 2019) Since 2/3 of the population in Brunei have a comfortable job with the state and therefore hardly anything to do, of course no value is placed on further training or special qualifications. So this time almost the same thing happened as in 2019, but without handcuffs.
But enough of that, now to the actual story, the luxury marina of Labuan.
About 20 years ago, Malaysia had the great idea of promoting yacht tourism and built up an infrastructure with wonderful marinas. However, a budget for care and maintenance and the use of capable managers were also neglected. As a result, almost all state marinas are now closed or, like here in Labuan, totally run down.
The state is now desperately looking for private investors who want to take over these run-down facilities. So also in Labuan.
A Chinese businessman and marina owner was found who was willing to restore the marina to its former glory. So far so good.
It takes millions to do that. Malaysian provincial government officials signed the contract. After that, it was found that the lease agreement can initially only be issued for 5 years. Since corruption is an issue here as well as in the whole of Southeast Asia, it would end in such a way that the highest responsible Malaysian official would probably take the renovated marina for himself or one of his relatives after the 5 years.
So the China man lets the marina rot …but still charges full dues. Great!
Unfortunately there are no safe anchorages in Labuan and we have to wait here for the delivery of our new dinghy. We have chosen the best jetty, of course there is no electricity either, we have secured ourselves as well as possible against rats on board and hope that our delivery will arrive soon.
