COMMONWEALTH Casino Commission Executive Director Andrew Yeom on Wednesday asked the CCC to schedule a revocation hearing on Imperial Pacific International’s exclusive casino license.
Yeom, through Assistant Attorney General Keisha Blaise, “respectfully requests” that the commission issue an order setting a revocation hearing for the complaints pertaining to unpaid annual exclusive casino license and regulatory fees.
IPI, which shut down in March 2020 due to Covid-19 restrictions, now owes the CNMI government over $62 million in exclusive casino license fee and more than $17.6 million in regulatory fee, for a total of over $79.6 million in unpaid fees.
The unpaid casino license and regulatory fees are owed for the years 2020 through 2023.
IPI has until Dec. 30, 2023 to pay what it owes the CNMI government.
The commission came up with a 30-day payment deadline after the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit reversed the District Court for the NMI’s decision referring the revocation case to arbitration.
On Nov. 6, 2023, IPI through its counsel of record, Xiaosheng Huang, filed with the U.S. Supreme Court a petition for writ of certiorari seeking a review of the Ninth Circuit ruling, stating, “Considerable uncertainty and inconsistency exists in the federal and state courts concerning delegation of arbitrability determinations in arbitration agreements with carve-outs, a particular problem given arbitration agreements routinely carve out particular claims or remedies.”
On Dec. 1, 2023, the commission chairman, Edward C. Deleon Guerrero, informed IPI Director How Yo Chi that “if IPI pays the $18.67 million for the 2023 fees, we can immediately start working on the settlement agreement before the next commission’s meeting scheduled for Dec. 28, 2023, just two days short of the deadline to pay in full the $62,010,280.”
Andrew Yeom
