Ruto’s Administration Urged To Sanction Open Sky Policy
By Tobby Otum
Tourism players have joined in an online petition that seeks to compel the Kenya Kwanza Alliance administration to sanction the open skies policy to boost the tourism industry’s dwindling fortunes.
The open skies policy seeks to liberalise and ease access and rules of use of national airports for foreign airlines in order to increase the flow of tourists.
The Director of Operations at Pollman Tours and Safaris Limited, Mr Mohamed Hersi, who started the petition over a fortnight ago, said that it was ripe for the new administration to adopt the policy.
”We humbly appeal to the new government to give this matter top priority. The manifesto of Kenya Kwanza is keen to create jobs, and tourism is the easiest vehicle to achieve that goal,” Hersi said.
He said that the open skies policy has changed the fortunes of Morocco where in less than 10 years, the country has jumped from two million to 12 million tourist arrivals. He added that the dying Durban city and Cape Town in South Africa have seen their fortunes change for the better once South Africa allowed the open skies policy.
Both Durban and Cape Town are now leading tourism destinations.
He said that in the absence of charter flights that used to fly from key source markets in Europe, Kenyan international tourism continues to struggle even as the world economy is on the full path to recovery after the impact of the devastating Covid-19 pandemic.
The hotelier added that the farmers at the Kenyan coast are also losing out on export of fruits, fish and even meat, when the cargo section at Moi International Airport is all but dead.
Hersi said that in 2012, he was part of a Kenyan delegation invited to Morocco as tourism players and were amazed with the increase of international visitors in less than seven years after signing an open skies policy with the European Union (EU).
Morocco signed an open skies agreement with the EU in 2005, representing the first aviation agreement of the EU with non-European country.
”As outlined in the agreement, EU and Moroccan carriers were allowed to operate to and from destinations in Morocco and the EU without price or capacity restrictions. The agreement also provides 5th freedom rights for both sides,” he said.
Soon after the agreement was signed, 22 new foreign companies commenced operations to and from Morocco. Nineteen European carriers including low-cost airline Ryanair and easyJet, as well as carriers from the region such as Buraq Air, Etihad and Turkish Airlines were attracted by the opportunities offered by the Moroccan market.
Low-cost airline Air Arabia even set up a new hub in Casablanca in 2009 featuring a fleet of Airbus 320 aircraft.
”In Kenya we are still dancing around 1 million serious international travelers with hardly earnings of $1.5 billion,” he pointed out.
Meanwhile, Galana lounge in Mombasa county, one of the re-opened entertainment pubs, has heavily invested in the installation CCTV cameras to curb the use of drugs by revelers in the club.
One the cub managers Ian Imbuana said the club’s first priority is the safety of the revelers inside and within the environs.
“Apart from the CCTV cameras the management of the club has installed screening machines at the club’s entrance purely to beef up security measures,” he pointed out.
Ian said they want to distance the club from being labeled a drugs users’ spot.
He was speaking during the reopening of the club along the famous Links Road in Nyali constituency in Mombasa county.
The Galana lounge Manager said the club, which was closed down due to the COVID 19 pandemic, has resumed normal services to customers.
He asked Mombasa governor Abdulswamad Nassir to expedite the proposed single license permit to business operators.
“The move will end the unnecessary multi-licensing in one business and it is a bold step which is welcome by upcoming businesses,” he pointed out.
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