Government are set to announce next week that the 2007 Grand Slam of Golf will take place in Bermuda, The Royal Gazette <$>can reveal.

After weeks of behind-the-scenes negotiations and fierce lobbying from other potential venues, this newspaper has been informed by well-placed sources that Premier Ewart Brown will confirm that a deal has been struck with the PGA of America to bring the made-for-television spectacular with $1.25 million prize money to the Island late next year.

The 36-hole strokeplay tournament, played between each year’s four Grand Slam winners and broadcast live on US cable network TNT, has been hosted by the Poipu Bay Golf Course in Hawaii since 1994.

World number one Tiger Woods has competed in every single Grand Slam he has qualified for, winning it for a record seventh straight year only last week.

Dr. Brown announced on October 11 — just 24 hours before resigning as Tourism Minister to challenge Alex Scott for the leadership of the Progressive Labour Party — that the Department of Tourism was “in the final stages of negotiation” with the PGA of America to have the 2007 and 2008 events played at the Mid Ocean Club.

In the interim, however, Government has remained tight-lipped on the issue while others involved in the negotiations, such as Mid Ocean vice-president David Ezekiel and the PGA of America’s communications director Julius Mason, have both indicated there were no guarantees.

Added to this, the golf director at the Poipu Bay Golf Course Craig Sasada insisted on November 8 that he wished to keep the tournament in Hawaii while Las Vegas was also mooted as a potential host.

However, sources at both the PGA of America and Mid Ocean have told The Royal Gazette <$>that Bermuda has now been given the thumbs up — although Government is prevented from making the news public until next week because of a contractual agreement with the PGA of America.

So excited was Dr. Brown at the prospect of making the announcement that he almost gave the game away at a public meeting held at Penno’s Wharf in St. George’s on Wednesday night.

Urging the media and the general public to adopt a more positive outlook on the state of their country, he said: “Next week I am going to make an announcement — I can’t sleep at the moment because I want to make the announcement now but I am under contract and I cannot do it. But it’s an announcement that will make all of you proud to be Bermudians.

“And when it’s announced, you are going to go back and remember headlines that essentially said that it was not happening, that it was not going to happen, that I was jumping the gun, that it’s nothing but politics. When we make the announcement, it will show that this is not the case.”

Pressed further on the matter yesterday, the Premier refused to expand on those remarks.

Mr. Ezekiel, meanwhile, said that he was “very hopeful that the announcement would be a positive one”.

PGA Grand Slam set to come here in 2007