Russian ski resort Krasnaya Polyana, venue for the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympic Games should Sochi win its bid, reopened Wednesday after shutting down due to a court decision the resort’s owners are calling the result of an ownership dispute.
Alpika-Service said, “all necessary parts and materials have been bought” (to repair defective equipment). In a statement issued at the reopening the company said it thinks it is now capable to present visitors with quality service.
The shutdown occurred after fire, sanitary and other inspectors visited the resort beginning January 3 and found multiple violations. Regional authorities said the inspections were linked to preparations for the visit by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) evaluation commission to Sochi February 20-24, reports the Associated Press.
A spokesman for Sochi’s bid committee was quoted in Kommersant saying, “the temporary stoppage of the chair lift won’t be reflected in the chances of Sochi’s Olympic bid. This is a private incident – an argument between two owners”.
The bid committee welcomed the reopening of the lifts saying, this “testifies to the safety of the sport infrastructure in Krasnaya Polyana”. The committee described the checks as a local initiative that was not connected to the Olympic bid.
Peter Fedin, director of Alpika-Servis, has said the court decision came as a result of Alpika’s attempt to challenge a gubernatorial order to give 10 hectares at the base of a children’s skiing school to a company called Ekotur, linked to the region’s lieutenant governor. Fedin said with real estate prices soaring 30 per cent each year Ekotur has undertaken the construction of expensive cottages on the 10 hectares in question.
Fedin said Alpika-Servis had no choice but to suspend operations, although authorities of the region accused him of trying to attract attention at a time when Russian President Vladimir Putin and top ministers were in Sochi where the Russian presidency has a residence.
Natalia Mamon, an aide to Krasnodar’s deputy governor, said, “the checks uncovered a number of violations at facilities of Alpika-Servis. We asked them to sort these problems out, not stage strikes”.
Fedin called the actions of local authorities as a “pure corporate raid”. He told the Associated Press the regional administration had indicated that Alpika-Servis should “hand over 50 per cent to it, but now apparently they want complete control. All this will affect Sochi’s international image as the IOC inspectors come here”, he said.
An official in the Krasnodar region’s administration said, “there is no campaign against them”.
But Gennady Shvets, spokesman for the Russian Olympic Committee, said that Alpika-Servis was not the right company to prepare for the Olympics should Sochi win the bid. According to the Associated Press he said, “they’re not up to it. This is too important to leave in the hands of a small firm, which doesn’t have the financial or organizational resources. More heavyweight structures need to get involved”.
