Dubai Ports World question

[MSUcruisers]

Would you be willing to cruise out of a port that has Dubai Ports World in charge of operations?

[cruzegirl]

not to yell but in a word........

NO!

[MzItaly79]

I'm praying I won't have to make that decision My 1st cruise MAY be in April :eek:

[wieslaw]

Hi,

If a 'foreign company / foreign country ' controls / manages our ports.......maybe, just maybe they will not enforce the so called 'Jones Act' and let us go from one US port to another........to them none of the ships will be 'foreign'..........all they (cruise ships) have to do is just register in Dubai........what you think ? maybe there will be no customs either ? so we can bring any thing we want .....

 

You see there is a silver lining even in this stormy clouds.....yes ? maybe ?

 

Wes

[DanJ]

The ports have no say whatsoever in enforcement of the Passenger Services Act. The ports are still US territory, no matter the nationality of the company managing them.

[wieslaw]

The ports have no say whatsoever in enforcement of the Passenger Services Act. The ports are still US territory, no matter the nationality of the company managing them.

 

Hi Dan, I am familiar with this old law......and yes, you are correct.......I am just being cynical.

 

Wes

[RevSmith]

I have a GREAT CONCERN, please read:

Dubai finishes buying P&O

 

Shareholders of British international port operator approve sale for $6.8 billion

By Meredith Cohn

Sun reporter

Originally published February 14, 2006

Dubai Ports World, a state-owned international port operator, cleared its last major hurdle yesterday in acquiring a British company that helps run several U.S. terminals, including Baltimore's, the companies said yesterday.

 

The acquisition of Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Co., whose shareholders agreed yesterday to accept Dubai Ports World's offer of 3.9 billion pounds, or $6.8 billion, in cash, would create the world's third-largest port operator, with 51 terminals in 30 countries. It will also give the aggressive Dubai a larger foothold in the booming trade between Asia and the United States.

 

P&O officials have said they expect the company to be run separately out of London and do not expect changes in U.S. operations in New York, New Jersey, New Orleans, Philadelphia and Baltimore.

 

P&O is the terminal operator and stevedore for container cargo at the Seagirt and Dundalk marine terminals, where it has about 65 employees.

 

F. Brooks Royster III, director of the Maryland Port Administration, which oversees the public marine terminals, said an infusion of money from Dubai Ports World might help the port expand.

 

The Dubai Ports World's purchase of P&O has not drawn opposition from world regulators or U.S. Homeland Security officials, who have labeled ports as potential terrorist targets.

 

Dubai Ports World "is owned by a monarchy, but it's a business and its money is the same color as everyone else's, only it's got more of it," said Peter S. Shaerf, managing director of AMA Capital Partners LLC, a merchant banking firm focused on the maritime and transportation industries.

 

Shaerf said the sale price is the most ever paid for any port operations company and was considered high by many analysts after Dubai Ports World and rival PSA International, of Singapore, bid up the price. PSA pulled out of the running last week.

 

Dubai Ports World, formerly Dubai Ports International, began as the port authority in Dubai. In 1999, it began aggressively buying up other port operations in the Middle East and around the world, Shaerf said.

 

In January 2005, the company moved farther into Asia and Europe with the acquisition of the international terminal business of CSX Corp. With that acquisition, it changed its named to Dubai Ports World.

 

The company reported that business has been growing 20 percent a year since 2001, but as a private company, it does not reveal its income.

 

Its port in Dubai, one of the world's largest for containers, is supported by a state economic entity that provides tax and other incentives to corporations moving to the emirate. Oil production and tourism support the hot Dubai economy.

 

Fred Duiven, a maritime analyst for the consultant Booz Allen Hamilton Inc., said Dubai Ports World still needs global scale and possibly the name recognition of the 165-year-old P&O, to better negotiate with carriers and suppliers that use the world's ports. The bulk of the world's trade moves by sea.

 

"This gets them into the United States and gets them a stronger presence in Europe," Duiven said.

 

What do you think?

[Keys2Heaven]

From what I understand it only has to do with management of the port infrastructure and not security. Dept. of HS will still have obligatory function of securing ports. It would be no different if port controlled by US.

 

Although I think the political fallout because of this decision will be tremendous. Most americans are not ready to entertain the idea of a middle eastern country having any type of control for any US port. Its the word 'control' that has most of us bugged. We equate control with power and security and feel that to relinquish control is to do just that...relinquish security.

 

I think what the President is trying to do is send a message to the folks in the middle east that we have to be willing to trust them sometime. Or maybe he's following the old saying that states "keep your friends close but your enemies closer".

[RevSmith]

This company is involved in cargo and cargo containers, our own government has stated that only 5 to 10 percent of these containers are inspected...isn't the risk involved too great a sacrifice for the premotion of public relations?

[c_galle]

This company is involved in cargo and cargo containers, our own government has stated that only 5 to 10 percent of these containers are inspected...isn't the risk involved too great a sacrifice for the premotion of public relations?

 

Working in HLS and having spent much time in UAE, I want to stress two points. The Company will not be able to divert or sneak past any inspections. The Company does not do the inspections. The risk we face has nothing to do with sneaking anything past inspections. Two, public relations isn't the issue. We do the same thing in ports all over the world. To say a country isn't good enough is just foolish when we pride ourselves on being a Capitalistic Country.

 

Try visiting Abu Dhabi and you will realize that it is the most magnificient country in the Region. The Economic business model of UAE is more spectacular than any other in the region.

[cruzegirl]

Ok, great. Does this now mean that if they buy P & O that they will also own Carnival, Princess and Cunard??? That is so not ok....... Someone wake Bush up because I'm now having a nightmare..... :eek: :mad:

[DanJ]

Hi Dan, I am familiar with this old law......and yes, you are correct.......I am just being cynical.

 

Wes

 

I'm glad that I took you wrong then. I hoped a person who has posted here as long as you would know better LOL. Perhaps a wink icon on a future post?

[DanJ]

Ok, great. Does this now mean that if they buy P & O that they will also own Carnival, Princess and Cunard??? That is so not ok....... Someone wake Bush up because I'm now having a nightmare..... :eek: :mad:

 

I'm having a nightmare thinking people actually think this way. What does Carnival have to do with any of this? In fact, what does Bush have to do with any of this?

[RevSmith]

I'm having a nightmare thinking people actually think this way. What does Carnival have to do with any of this? In fact, what does Bush have to do with any of this?[/quote]

 

I know this can't be a serious question...you appeared to know what you were talking about.

[KarenR_UK]

Ok, great. Does this now mean that if they buy P & O that they will also own Carnival, Princess and Cunard??? That is so not ok....... Someone wake Bush up because I'm now having a nightmare..... :eek: :mad:

 

The P+O company that has been sold is not the Cruise Company - from what I have read elsewhere, the original P+O company was split up several years ago - the cruise division became P+O / Princess and that was then merged with Carnival / Cunard etc.

 

There are several other threads on the Cunard part of the board that explain it much better :)

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=301769

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=300108

 

 

I am sure there were others, but I cannot find them now!:D

 

... Which you know because you have posted on at least one of them (thought I recognised the name!)

 

Some further articles from the UK side of thing are here

http://archive.thisishampshire.net/2006/2/20/98985.html

http://archive.thisishampshire.net/2006/1/27/98164.html (an bit out of date this one!)

Again cannot find the one I was actually looking for !

 

 

Karen

[BobBeaSea]

Would I sail out of a port controlled by Dubai Ports World-YES.

[spongerob]

This is a classic example of how the US media can stir up emotion by presenting isolated facts and playing on peoples' fear and prejudice. As of now, no major US port is managed by a US-owned and operated company. None. And all we're talking about is the cranes, storage areas, etc. which will be still be good Union jobs for Americans.

 

Sens. Clinton and Schumer started all this to score political points, now both sides are scrambling to say they are the party MORE concerned about security. Which is interesting, because the Republicans have been very slow to to plug gaping holes in border security, and when anyone does try to bring that issue up, the Democrats start screaming that such actions are racist and reactionary.

 

All this would be instantly forgotten by the press if Cheney decided to go bird hunting this weekend. :)

 

Oh, and to answer the original question, yes I would. Many of us have probably done so already whether we know it or not.

[RevSmith]

I don't think this is a political issue...this is a post 9/11 caution. Over and over again we hear about home land security...protect against terrorism, etc. Our ports are not protected properly and never have been. Containers are permitted to lay around, unopened and uninspected for long periods of time. Oh and here comes the name calling...how about NO MORE RED HERRINGS! Get with the issues at hand and stop mixing in all this muck and name calling. It's so tiring!

[spongerob]

Rev, it's all political whether we like it or not. Principles and rational thought disappeared long ago because neither can be included in a 7-second sound bite.

[greatam]

I got this yesterday from a business associate. I posted it on the other "Ports" thread. This blurb states very succinctly what the problem is. I do not know the origin of this quote.

 

"Of greater concern to me are some of the security implications of this deal in the longer term. The DPW purchase of P&O could create a strong incentive for al-Qaeda and related groups to cultivate insiders at DPW to learn about security operations at ports. It’s not difficult to imagine scenarios where a well-positioned insider could learn sensitive tactical information such as the conditions used to select containers for additional screening (perhaps via retrospective analysis of selectees) or the daily cycle of security operations at key ports, which could assist with attacks and/or smuggling activities. Of course, there is known terrorist activity in the countries where all of the other major port operators are headquartered, so any of them could be similarly infiltrated today. The question is whether the insider threat would be greater with DPW.

 

A second longer-term implication is what impact that this would have on US intelligence, both in terms of preventing an attack and conducting a post-incident investigation. Would this impair the information flow related to critical counterterror and counterproliferation activities in the maritime domain? And if there were an attack involving an American port, would DPW open up its corporate records in Dubai and allow its non-US-based employees to be questioned by the FBI in the same way that a British-owned company would? On this last point, I’m initially skeptical."

[greatam]

Evidently Treasury Secretary John Snow and CFIUS (Committee on Foreign Investments in the US) left the President in the dark until this was a done deal. And CFIUS did the oversight in 20-25 days. You can't even do the financial analysis in that amount of time. This from AP in the last hour

 

BREAKING NEWS

 

Updated: 10:43 a.m. ET Feb. 22, 2006

WASHINGTON - President Bush was unaware of the pending sale of shipping operations at six major U.S. seaports to a state-owned business in the United Arab Emirates until the deal already had been approved by his administration, the White House said Wednesday

[Big Spanker]

Look all of the freight in the containers comes mostly from other countries.Yes other countries where the ports are managed by Foreign countries and many managed by UAE. Yes if the terrorists wanted to sneak nukes etc in they would do it through other countries not wait until it gets to the US. As to sailing to or from a foreign owned port in the US I would have no problems with it. Our US Navy docks in Dubia daily and the navy will tell you that it is one of the safest ports in the World. Why is it that suddenly all Arabs are Suspected terrorists. Hell We can't even profile then at our major airports because it would be profiling. Hillary was screaming about that after 9/11. Now she wants to profile. Thats why we scrreen all the grandmothers and children. Yep security risks. Bottom line it is all politics. The sale was done through a bi-partisen committee, But than again the media has nothing else to cover anyway. Well gotta go have to get off the computer as Bush and Cheney are probably secretly monitoring my communications and violating my civil rights. Wait I hear the black helicopters over my house right now, Better get those library books back before Roberto Gonzales seizes my Libbrary records for close scrutiny.

Deanhamy

[cruzegirl]

Bush unaware of the impending sale of the running of the ports?? My rear end he was unaware..... Talk about back peddling... He thought he could just do it and no one would find out.... And if he truthfully was unaware, that's a sad case for our President who should be "in-the-know" of all these things.....And some may say, "the UAE runs other ports and our navy ships dock in their country and it's safe".. Well to me that's a big difference over allowing them free access in the U.S. and free access to run out ports.....Especially when, according to news reports, the UAE have ties with supporting terrorists financially.... Some of the money the terrorists have used have come from/through the UAE.... I say, No Way Man..... But that's me and we are all entitled to our opinions.....

[RevSmith]

please, I beg of you, I feel your emotion...but the issue IS ...we may possibily be breaching our national security... is this were we want to be? I feel very strongly that this deal could become a national catrosphe. Please stict to the issues!

[Seabee]

How many Arabs are serving as crew members on the ships you all sail on...whats a few more at the port gonna mean?