The travel and tourism sector in South Africa has ramped up its lobbying efforts this week as it faces increasing financial pressure – with the threat of retrenchments and closures hanging over its head – due to government-mandated lockdown as a result of the global COVID-19 pandemic.
In her Budget Vote speech earlier this week (July 22) Minister of Tourism, Mmamoloko Kubayi-Ngubane, said the country’s tourism sector faced a potential 75% reduction in revenue for 2020, thus putting at risk a further R149.7bn (€7.8bn) in output, 438 000 jobs and R80.2bn (€4.2bn) in foreign receipts.
Industry has therefore collaborated in its efforts to highlight the plight of the sector, taking to the streets, creating social media campaigns and looking at legal options available, to fast-track the opening of the country, which is on its 120th day of national lockdown (as of Friday, July 24).
Groups formed on Facebook and WhatsApp have been promoting the ‘Open tourism in South Africa now’ petition. The petition calls on Kubayi-Ngubane to lift restrictions and save the industry.
Individual tourism companies have also started their own petitions, including lodge operator, Seolo Africa, who have started a petition for the reopening of tourism under strict health protocols.
“Every day without trade threatens the long value chain linked to tourism: jobs; the money our staff members spend at local shops and use to pay school fees; the staff-bus owner whose business we helped set up and many other income streams that help support the fabric of society here,” said Director of Seolo Africa, Jann Kingsley.
CEO of More Family Collection, Robert More, is leading the charge with legal action on behalf of game lodges across the industry – a movement that has also gained traction through social media. Requests have been made in the game lodge sub-sector for donations to pay the legal fees, as the process is costly, according to More.
The plea is to lift the ban on leisure travel, and a lawyer’s letter was sent to government this week. “Should we not receive an answer, or one that is sufficiently rational, we intend to urgently approach a court to declare the ban on game lodge leisure travel to be unlawful, invalid and contrary to the constitution,” said More.
Although More’s fight is for game lodges, the industry can no longer be subdivided when approaching government, said Rob Hutchinson, Founder and MD of Dear SA, a non-profit platform that facilitates public involvement in the shaping of government policies. He told Tourism Update that, without changing the approach to represent the industry as a whole, government would not listen.
Hutchinson referred to the plight of private charter transport operators who have received no assistance from government.
Chairperson of the Private Charter Coach Association (PCCA), Fiona Brooke-Leggatt, has recognised the need to represent more of the industry and has started a petition for all licensed tourism, charter and game-viewing vehicles asking that their pre-paid licence fees be refunded by government.
“Those fees are paid six months in advance, and have gone unused for the last four months.” She explained that the refunding of the fees would provide significant financial relief to many in the tourism industry and not just those represented by the PCCA.
Charter transport and other tourism vehicles have taken part in peaceful protests around the country. On July 17, in Mpumalanga game vehicles drove from White River to the government buildings in Nelspruit.
Similar protests took place in Durban and the central Drakensberg on Wednesday (July 22), and more are planned to take place in Johannesburg and Cape Town today (Friday, July 24) and throughout the weekend.
Protestors have carried signs and decorated vehicles with messages asking for restrictions to be lifted to save jobs in the industry.
