CARISA LEE

It’s of­fi­cial.  Movi­eTowne Ch­agua­nas will be closed per­ma­nent­ly, leav­ing on­ly the Port-of-Spain and San Fer­nan­do branch­es.

 The news broke this morn­ing, via a brief state­ment is­sued by Movi­eTowne Own­er, Derek Chin, who said af­ter many weeks of in­tense ne­go­ti­a­tions with the land­lord of Price Plaza Shop­ping Mall, both par­ties could not agree on a res­o­lu­tion.

Chin said as a re­sult, Movi­eTowne de­cid­ed to close down per­ma­nent­ly and to re­move its as­sets and pres­ence from the mall.

The own­er apol­o­gised to all the Cen­tral and Ch­agua­nas pa­trons who sup­port­ed his com­pa­ny for the last 10 years and added that they will look at al­ter­na­tive pos­si­bil­i­ties once the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic is no more.

Last week, Chin said he told the land­lords of Price Plaza that he could no longer af­ford what was be­ing charged and asked for an ad­just­ment on the rent.

He was hop­ing for a pos­i­tive out­come.

Chin re­opened his oth­er cin­e­mas last Tues­day, af­ter the green light was giv­en by the Prime Min­is­ter, for op­er­at­ing at 50% ca­pac­i­ty.

The full text of the state­ment fol­lows…

STATE­MENT BY MOVI­ETOWNE OWN­ER, DEREK CHIN.

Af­ter many weeks of in­tense ne­go­ti­a­tions with our land­lord we have been un­able to re­solve our sta­tus at MT Ch­agua­nas. As a re­sult MT has made a fi­nal de­ci­sion to close down per­ma­nent­ly and to re­move its as­sets and pres­ence from Price Plaza Mall. 

We wish to say sor­ry to all our Cen­tral and Ch­agua­nas pa­trons who have sup­port­ed us over the last 10 years but can as­sure you, we will be look­ing at al­ter­na­tive pos­si­bil­i­ties once the COVID virus is­sue is min­i­mized.

Thank you again and please con­tin­ue to sup­port us at our oth­er two branch­es at C3 Mall in South, and Movi­eTowne Mall in Port of Spain.