‘Tshwane ready to open the tourism sector’ – mayor

The city of Tshwane has celebrated the 58th anniversary of Africa Day.

In partnership with the Tshwane Economic Development Agency (TEDA), the metro on Tuesday held the commemoration of the commemoration.

“Today’s special event was deliberately planned to engage and celebrate our multiple African identities,” said Tshwane mayor Randall Williams.

The metro hosted the event to not only celebrate Africa Day but to emphasise the importance of unity among African countries.

The metro also took the opportunity to highlight the city’s tourism sector and the opportunities readily available to other African countries and the rest of the world.

Members of the African diplomatic community were invited to showcase the city’s tourism and leisure activities.

“The celebration of Africa Day allows us to highlight the importance of continuing to strengthen relationships with not only our international community but specifically with our African brothers and sisters,” said Dr Lardo Stander, acting CEO of TEDA.

The municipality announced that it was ready to open its doors to the rest of the African continent. This will be done while adhering strictly to Covid-19 protocols and adopting a “safety first” approach.

“For us, one of the key strategic sectors that need immediate attention is tourism, particularly the meetings incentives conferences events (MICE) industry.

Travel and capacity restrictions have had a devastating impact on the MICE industry. However, I am pleased to see TEDA leading efforts to revive this sector using new solutions and strategic adaptability,” said Williams.

He said the tourism sector needed to be restarted and the rollout of vaccinations would ensure “safe channels” to promote intra-Africa tourism.

“As a city, we confidently call on African nations to consider Tshwane as their preferred business and leisure destination. We have the resources, the experience and we are excited by the opportunity to continue to work with our fellow African countries to revive our economies together and safely,” said Williams.

“We are very aware of the dangers of Covid-19 and active in trying to continue to mitigate the spread of this disease while continuing with economic activity,” said Bronwen Cadle de Ponte, chairperson of Tshwane Tourism Association Meetings Chapter.

The city reported that the African continent had lost 74% of its tourism revenue due to the Covid-19 pandemic. They said that the continent needed to focus more on unity and less on a nationalist approach.

“We need to rethink tourism in Africa and focus on growing our domestic tourism sectors. We need focus on making tourists out of Africans,” said Lee-Anne Bac, the director of Advisory Services: BDO South Africa.

She said Africans needed to develop a tourism product that was more African and less Eurocentric. She said Africans needed to think beyond nationalism and adopt one set of Covid protocols across Africa. Bac said the continent needed to be more consistent in their regulations and testing.

“It’s very difficult for tourists at the moment to travel across Africa when they have got different rules and requirements for not just different countries but also different regions in the same country.”

She said they needed to have a “universal agreed approach to how we handle vaccinated tourists”.

Bac along with all the speakers emphasised the importance of Africans working together to strengthen tourism, trade and intercontinental relations.

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