To attract tourists, give up our towns to foreigners

Donald E. Hawkins, professor of tourism policy at George Washington University, says that “… tourism is a goose that not only lays a golden egg but also fouls its own nest.” For us in Kenya, we do not mind the fouling as long as we get the golden egg. It is for this reason that tourism is listed as No 1 on our economic pillars in the Vision 2030. But for us to get the golden egg, we have to build the nest first.

Port-of-entry arrivals

With certainty, we do not know how many tourists visit our country annually. The statistics are as different as the statisticians doing them. There is no agreed methodology. However, most countries use the number of port-of-entry arrivals, hotel accommodation, nights spent and hotel receipts to compute the number.

What is not in dispute is that France is the world’s leading destination with more than 80 million tourists annually while Kenya receives a paltry 500,000 to 1,000,000. More people visit the L’Aquarium de Barcelona, an aquarium in Barcelona, than Kenya. We do not need more policy or vision papers for Kenya to attract more tourists. Our economy remains primitive relying on raw agricultural produce; God having decided in His omniscience not to give us oil and other cursed minerals.

As tourism needs little creativity to develop and in any event, we shall not re-invent the wheel, our country has little choice but fall back on it. We need only to take a virtual tour of those places that have succeeded and imitate or better them. When Najib Balala said that we close schools for three months to promote local tourism, he may have been well-intentioned, though off the mark.

Tourists, whether local or foreign, travel for a purpose. We travel for leisure but also to see wildlife, forests and architectural marvels and often-times for religious and medical reasons. Many women now go to Argentina to lift their busts and shape their noses. Others go to Philippines during Easter to see mass actual crucifixions.

Our Vision 2030 intends to develop two unidentified resort cities in the coast and an additional one in Isiolo. We need to mention these resorts to develop and have a clear programme on them. For us to take off as a tourist destination, Malindi, Lamu, Diani, Naivasha, Isiolo and Narok have to be set apart as the resort cities and, by law, make them so. As we do not have enough money even to meet our budgetary requirements, we cede these towns to be developed by foreigners.

In the 1930s, Las Vegas was a decrepit desert town that wasn’t in any tourist itinerary. As the war against the mafia and internecine mafia wars increased, some of the big mafia boys of the day wanted their own safe oasis. Lucky Luciano, Meyer Lansky and Bugsy Siegel, the A-Lister mafia, relocated to Las Vegas and built it literally out of the desert sands. The sordid origins of Las Vegas have receded to history and it is now a glitzy entertainment and gambling resort receiving over 38 million tourists annually.

Sun City in South Africa was built in the late 1970s in the middle of nowhere on the dreams of one man: Sol Kerzner. Then, apartheid South Africa did not allow gambling or prostitution. Bophuthatswana was a false “independent” state under Lucas Mangope and purportedly allowed Kerzner to develop Sun City “outside” South African moral laws. As they say, the rest is history and Sun City is now South Africa’s biggest tourist destination.

Why the history of Las Vegas and Sun City? It is because Kenya needs to be realistic and turn over Malindi to Italians, Naivasha and Narok to British, Lamu and Diani to Germans and Isiolo to Dubai with a licence that they develop them into major tourist destinations.

Each town can adopt the character of its benefactors. The Constitution allows the Government to compulsorily acquire land for public use. The legal doctrine of eminent domain gives government such powers that it can grab a whole town. American jurisprudence has expanded this doctrine to enable government sanction grabbing of private property by private developer.

Indonesia is the world’s biggest Muslim country and Jamaica is as Third World as any Third World country can be and both don’t have glamour images. Yet both have respectively allowed the tourist enclaves of Bali and Montego Bay to develop and prosper as though autonomous. Bali, though in Indonesia, is as Australian as Melbourne while Montego Bay is as American as Miami. In fact, Montego Bay, and not the capital Kingston, has Jamaica’s biggest airport and world class transport infrastructure.

It is the mega-developers who, when we cede our said towns, will be able to develop other facilities. Tourists go to Sun City and Las Vegas for the casinos, water games and theatres. Kenyans cannot fill the 120-seater Phoenix Theatre but you cannot get a ticket for one of the many 5,000 seater theatres in Las Vegas. Because of the amount of money invested in such resort cities, no stops are pulled in staging musicals and shows.

In the near future, let us see Naivasha becoming as English resort city as Blackpool. And let Malindi be as Italian as Florence and Diani as German as Heiligendamm. Our country needs to start attracting 10 million tourists per year. If we cannot attract them our own way, let those who know do it for us.

dkipkorir@ktk.co.ke