Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

SKYJET RECEIVES AIRCRAFT AHEAD OF OPERATIONS START

SKYJET RECEIVES AIRCRAFT AHEAD OF OPERATIONS START
Uganda’s latest addition to international aviation, Skyjet, has last weekend received a refurbished Boeing 737-200 from the US. The aircraft, fresh from heavy maintenance, will offer 8 business class and 92 economy class seats. The full-service airline is due to start operations either later in 2008 or in early 2009, once route rights have been assigned by the regulators. From well-informed sources it is understood that the airline will commence flights with routes from Entebbe to Juba and on to Khartoum, before launching flights to Cairo some time later. Sensibly, flights on the competitive Nairobi route are not on the drawing board any time soon. A very familiar face has also joined up with them as Commercial Director, being the former Kenya Airways country manager Emmanuel Okware, who has for the past two and a half years been building up his corporate travel agency in Kampala. Watch this space for more news updates.

NDEGE JUU ANNOUNCES FLEET ADDITIONS FOR 2009
The latest domestic and charter airline going into operations just a few weeks ago has now announced its plans for next year. Ndege Juu presently operates among other aircraft a Swiss built Pilatus PC 12, which is available in various changeable configurations. The company will add two more of these modern aircraft to their Kajjansi based fleet in 2009. A pressurised cabin and high ceiling of nearly 30,000 feet makes flights with the PC 12 very comfortable and allows non stop flights across the entire Eastern, Central and Southern African region even into very small airstrips. Location at the Kajjansi airfield is the “Old Terminal,” which was taken over and completely refurbished by the Ndege team. Contact them via [email protected] or visit www.ndegejuu.com

FUEL SHORTAGE HITS AGAIN
Kampala has again been hit by a fuel shortage, causing panic buying from motorists trying to get some of the available fuel into their tanks. Sources have attributed the repeat shortage on several factors, including but not restricted to outright profiteering, the removal of the fourth axle on fuel tankers by Kenya, repairs to the main pipeline from Mombasa and speculation over the trend of the Uganda shilling versus the US dollar, which has in recent weeks fallen sharply making imports more expensive. The removal directive for the fourth trailer axle, while aimed to protect against overloading and the constant severe damage to roads, was clearly carried out in a haphazard fashion and tankers can now only carry 30,000 liters of fuel instead of previously 42,000 liters per trip to the depots in Eldoret, reducing carrying capacity by over a quarter and leaving fuel companies struggling to import their regular requirements. Once again, it is being stressed that safari operators to hold sufficient fuel supplies to do their safaris so visiting tourists should in no way be inconvenienced.

TOURIST LEAPS TO HIS DEATH
A British tourist visitor to Uganda jumped to his death at Murchisons Falls, where he appears to have gone with this intent. Uganda Wildlife Authority and security personnel have confirmed that they found a suicide note in the self drive car parked near the site which is open for walks to the falls view points. No body has been recovered by the time of going to press. This is the first known case of a suicide at the falls since the area was declared a national park many decades ago.

KAMPALA SERENA JOINS ‘LEADING HOTELS’
Now some years into operation the Kampala Serena Hotel has reportedly been granted membership in Leading Hotels of the World, a global reservations and marketing ‘cooperative’ for up-market hotels, after a period of vetting and quality audits.

NORFOLK COMPLETES RENOVATION
Nairobi’s landmark hotel has announced the completion of phase one of their ongoing renovations and refurbishments, which concluded last week with the relaunch of the acclaimed Lord Delamare Terrace. A new look and ambience, combined with much applauded food and service, are bound to not only retain the “old faithful” but win the hotel new clientele. The Norfolk is part of the Kenyan operation of Fairmont Hotels, a member of Leading Hotels of the World and long time favorite of the “Who is Who” from Kenya, the region and around the world.
The Norfolk and it’s sister properties Mount Kenya Safari Club, Aberdare Country Club, The Ark and the Mara Safari Club received a massive refurbishment boost two years ago when Fairmont committed some US$200+ million for refurbishments, renovations and upgrades to retain their five-star ratings.

KENYA BAGS RESPONSIBLE TOURISM AWARD AT WTM
Porini Safari Camps / Gamewatchers Safaris were the winner of the prestigious Virgin Holidays sponsored ‘Responsible Tourism Awards’. The company, owned by KTB Chairman Jake Grieves-Cook, excelled with their business concept of high revenue / low impact operations and their partnership with the local communities for employment and income generation. Well done Porini! Visit www.porinisafaricamps.com or www.porini.com for more information.

KTDC CHIEF EXECUTIVE ‘SACKED’
The Kenyan minister for tourism has reportedly sacked the CEO of the Kenya Tourist Development Corporation last week over a range of allegation, none however proven so far. The official reason peddled to the media is “non performance,” but there is intense speculation over the real reasons why the minister resorted to this extraordinary measure, instead of letting Mr. Obondo Kajumbi serve out his present contract. A court case over the contract termination is also not ruled out by some observers in Nairobi. Some of the reasons which prompted the minister to resort to this measure may be vested in the fact that KTDC was subject to rumours about the potential sale of shareholdings in various hotels and tourism enterprises, including the Nairobi Intercontinental Hotel, Kenya Safari Lodges (Mombasa Beach Hotel, Voi Safari Lodge and Ngulia Safari Lodge) and the Nairobi Hilton, but Mr. Kajumbi had earlier on stated that there was no intention ‘at the moment’ to divest from these assets. Ominously, KTDC also owns the Utalii Hotel, which is the training and application facility for the famous Utalii College, causing some concern over the future security of this major institution.

FLY540 TANZANIA UPDATE
The Tanzanian aviation regulators have now granted an Air Services License to Fly540’s Tanzanian company, which is now going ahead to have their AOC application processed. The unnecessarily expensive, because now triplicate process (in Kenya, Uganda and now Tanzania), is a relic of pre-East African Community separatism, when regulators kept jealous watch over their little fiefdoms, a concept without merit and substance in this day and age of the EAC integrating economically. However, instead of pooling resources, sharing personnel and administering aviation jointly with immediate mutual recognition and acceptance of approvals, licenses and permits, the regulators appear to peddle mitigating reasons for not joining hands rather than putting all their best efforts into achieving a common regulatory regime.

Once the AOC has been issued news will be availed to column readers about the type of aircraft operated from the Fly540 Tanzania base and which routes will be flown. Watch this space.

RWANDA ADDS TRAVEL TRAINING CAPACITY
The Rwanda Tourism University College in Kigali has announced over the last weekend that they intend to add IATA certified courses for aspiring travel agents and agency personnel, starting from early 2009. This development comes after signing a Memorandum of Understanding with the Nairobi based “Air Travel and Related Studies Centre” on technical cooperation.

RWANDANS FREE TO WORK AND LIVE IN KENYA
During a recent state visit by President Kibaki to Rwanda the Kenyan president announced the immediate shelving of work permit requirements for Rwandan citizens, reciprocating an earlier move by Rwanda to do the same for Kenyan citizens. Ugandans, Tanzanians and Burundian, however, will continue to be subject to work permit applications, until similar bilateral moves are introduced between the member states, in particular in view of the next column item.

While in Rwanda the Kenyan president also expressed his solidarity with Rwanda over what was termed ‘the illegal arrest’ of Rwanda’s Chief of Protocol while on official duty as advance party to the Head of State. Mass demonstrations took place in Rwanda against France and Germany over their ‘conspiracy’ to have Col. Rose Kabuye arrested and extradited to France.

EAST AFRICAN COMMUNITY PARTNERS SQUABBLE AGAIN
News have emerged during the week of renewed arguments breaking out at the most recent round of negotiations in Zanzibar between the member states. Tanzania was in regional media widely blamed for throwing again a spanner in the works, when reneging on a previously agreed position by the Council of Ministers over the use of national ID cards for citizens when travelling to the sister states. The argument extended also to the rights of residence, rights to acquisition of land and generally the movement of labour within the EAC. Notably, all other four member states formally agreed on the proposals and will in early 2009 launch a joint initiative to move agreements away from unanimous decisions to majority decisions, to avoid a single partners constantly standing in the face of the others. Watch this space.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

QUEEN ELIZABETH LIONS UNDER THREAT

QUEEN ELIZABETH LIONS UNDER THREAT
The population of lions, which stood at nearly 250 a decade ago, according to census figures on file from those days, has now literally halved due to revenge killings by illegal herders driving their cattle into the park in search of pasture. Only now are reports emerging in the local media that another two lions were found poisoned recently. Other predators too are said to be under threat by herdsmen such as hyenas and leopards, all of which consider cattle in the park as prey and follow their instincts of hunting when hungry.

Tree climbing lions within the Southern or Ishasha sector of the park have been a major attraction, as there are few places in Eastern Africa where lions can be seen on trees (only at Kidepo Valley National Park in North Eastern Uganda and the Lake Manyara National Park in Tanzania) and a further reduction in the lion population would put this priceless resource at major risk of extinction. Watch this space.

AGREEMENT ON NILE WATERS STILL DISTANT
News have emerged in Kampala of fundamental disagreements over the use of the Nile waters by Sudan and Egypt, with the objections being raised by primarily Uganda and Kenya. Both governments demand that the 1929 and 1954 treaties, imposed on the East African countries by former colonial power Britain, be scrapped and the water be treated as a natural resource of the source countries, rather than having Sudan and Egypt carry literal veto powers over any and all developments in Eastern Africa using contributory river waters, lake waters and Nile waters. It was also learned that the Egyptian monitors based in Jinja as the main power plant have been stopped from accessing water flow data for the time being, probably a pressure measure to compel the lower Nile countries concede major points in the ongoing negotiations.

A meeting on these issues between the Nile Basin countries presidents did reportedly not take place. The latest development also puts to rest allegations from other East African countries that Uganda had struck a one-on-one deal with Egypt following a brief stopover by Egyptian President Mubarak in Entebbe a few weeks ago.

KLM ADDS 5TH FLIGHT TO ENTEBBE
In a welcome development for Ugandan exporters and travelers the Dutch airline has now announced the addition of another non-stop flight between Entebbe and Amsterdam, operating every Monday on A330-200 equipment. The flights will commence in early December, in time for the busy holiday season and arrival and departure times at both Amsterdam and Entebbe will remain the same. The airline also announced extra flights to New York and Washington, making connections to and from the US even easier.

MORE COURT ACTION ON ‘KAMPALA HILTON’
As of November 7, 2008, the High Court in Kampala, on repeat application, stayed an earlier order for the immediate sale of the property when it issued an interim stay until the main issue will be decided in court on November 11th, according to local media reports. Earlier court decisions way back in May 2008 in related matters saw Aya’s previous lawyers being awarded nearly 2.5 million US Dollars in fees and VAT, arising from services rendered when securing a loan. Watch this space as the saga continues, none of which is doing the reputation of the project any good.
Meanwhile, another AYA company has reportedly also ran into financial trouble, when the High Court in Kampala ordered the attachment and sale of assets of Pan Africa Commodities Ltd., a subsidiary of Aya Investments. Again at the heart of the issue are unpaid legal fees, in this case worth over US$250,000. It is expected that more full mouthed denials will be peddled in public by representatives of the ‘Aya’ brothers, and again such denials will largely be removed from reality. Appeals in higher courts are not ruled out but this latest case against the brothers companies simply speaks for itself.

AIR UGANDA MAKES ONE YEAR
The Ugandan private airline has now marked its first anniversary since taking to the skies a year ago. The past 12 months were dominated by a global aviation crisis over exploding fuel prices and an economic downturn with reduced passenger numbers, making the survival of upstart airlines in this environment even more remarkable.

KENYA AVIATION UPDATE
This column is publishing a hard hitting piece from the regular ‘Aero Club of Kenya’ newsletter, in which the (predicted) fallout of the hastily introduced new air services regulations is highlighted:

‘OBAMANIA’ KEEPS DOMINATING THE REGIONAL MEDIA
Following the election victory of Barack Obama in the US presidential elections, the regional media keeps the story on the front and inside pages of all publications, a trend expected to reduce only marginally as time goes on, at least until the date of Obama taking office in late January.

Much expectation is also being expressed on what Obama will do for Kenya, Eastern Africa and the continent at large, often leaving reality out of the equation when writing up wish lists, which the readership is happily gobbling up.

AIR TANZANIA WOES CONTINUE
Only weeks after having several of their aircraft out of service due to a failed engine and a cracked cockpit window, this time round it seems to be the absence of tyres for their Airbus A320, which caused the airline to cancel some of their flights. Comments were also sought from reliable sources within and near the airline about the governmental subsidy, which appears not to have been paid for a while now, hampering the restructuring of Air Tanzania to the benefit of other airlines in the country.

Meanwhile, former managing partner South African Airways has taken the Tanzanian flag carrier to court over alleged outstanding loans advanced to the airline during the period of cooperation. This is again casting doubts over government’s commitment to put the airline on a sound financial footing by meeting, as agreed under the separation between the two carriers, all related cost and obligations. There are fears now that the Air Tanzania aircraft may be impounded at some stage in the future when landing in Johannesburg, if the debt worth over 4 million US Dollars is not settled soon. Watch this space.

PRECISION AIR CEMENTS MARKET POSITION
Further to the previous report on Air Tanzania, news have also been received that Tanzania’s leading private airline (Kenya Airways holds 49 percent of the shares in this company) has now formally launched the second of their ordered seven brand new ATR 72-500 fleet. The fast turboprop aircraft is offering greater flight economics, very important at this day and age of volatile fuel prices. The first new aircraft joined Precision already in March this year as reported in this column and five more ATR’s will be delivered in coming months to support route and capacity expansion. Precision Air’s investment in the new fleet is valued at nearly US$130 million, a firm commitment to the future of the airline in difficult times for the global aviation industry.

With the arrival of the new aircraft Precision will in early December begin to offer twice daily Mwanza flights and expand their Nairobi schedule too to meet the extra demand for seats.

RWANDA MERGES ORTPN INTO ‘RWANDA DEVELOPMENT BOARD’
The Rwanda Office for Tourism and National Parks was recently merged together with several other governmental bodies and authorities into the new ‘Rwanda Development Board’, which will under one combined governmental budget oversee several functions, including that of tourism promotion and wildlife management and conservation.

The director general of the former ORTPN, Mrs. Rosette Rugamba, is now holding the position of deputy CEO in charge of tourism and conservation at the new organization. New email and web contacts will be availed in due course. Congratulations to Rosette and all the best in the future within the new organization.

CONGO UPDATE
The information received last week from usually well informed sources in Rwanda, that Zimbabwean troops were fighting alongside Kinshasa regime units and their allied militias, has now been amended. It has been confirmed in both Kinshasa and by UN sources in Eastern Congo, that Angolan army units were indeed flown into the Congo and have been deployed. Angola in an earlier Congo conflict was fighting on the side of Kabila senior (who had welshed on earlier commitments made to his erstwhile supporters Rwanda and Uganda), alongside Zimbabwe, which could have been the cause of the erroneous naming of the outside country now involved again in the struggle.

Meanwhile, calls have been emerging to break up the Congo into more manageable and cohesive regional units of government so that peace could return to those self-governed areas, but Kinshasa is likely to resist any moves to have parts of the country like the mineral rich Katanga region secede and taking the revenues accrued and so far largely kept in Kinshasa with them.

The presence of foreign, non UN or AU troops in the Congo may also draw the other protagonists back into action, as the political lines continue to be drawn as sharply as they were back in the ‘90s.

The peace summit in Nairobi last week also failed to reach a lasting conclusions and negotiations and discussions on how to best solve the problems of Eastern Congo are said to be ongoing at regional, continental and international levels. Also, contrary to reports in some select international media, there is no evidence of any direct involvement in the fighting from either Rwanda or Uganda and both governments have issued strongly worded denials to the allegations, which were likely peddled by the Kinshasa regime trying to deflect international attention from their own sorry situation.

Meanwhile, the provocative and irresponsible arrest by German border police of Rwanda’s Chief of Protocol upon arrival in Frankfurt, where she arrived to prepare for the visit of President Kagame a day later, was condemned by both Rwanda and Uganda in the strongest possible terms. It is understood, that 23 French nationals, leading politicians and military personnel, will be indicted soon by Rwandese prosecutors, while another 10 cases are nearing the completion of investigations. This is for their alleged complicity in the 1994 Rwanda Genocide, where France played – to put it mildly – a most dubious role. Relations between France and Rwanda have now again hit rock bottom and the German Ambassador in Kigali has also been asked to leave the country within 24 hours. The African Union is in full support of Rwanda’s position and has equally lodged protests with the European Union. This ‘side show’ will obviously not be helpful for a swift and comprehensive solution of the conflict in Eastern Congo, so watch this space as future newsbreak.

VOLCANIC ERUPTION REPORTED FROM ETHIOPIA
News have been received from Addis Ababa about a recent volcanic eruption in the North Eastern region of Afar. According to additional information some 30 square kilometers have been covered by lava from the eruption, which also registered as a minor earthquake.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

KLM HITS MARKET WITH UNBELIEVABLE USA FARE

KLM HITS MARKET WITH UNBELIEVABLE USA FARE
The Dutch national airline has advertised, for a very few select dates only, a return fare from Entebbe to the US starting from US$660. Needless to say, in the newspaper advertisement, a rider was added in the very smallest print possible, ‘*terms and conditions apply,’ which, in spite of using regular, reading glasses, this correspondent required a magnifying glass to even read the text. When calling the airline’s Kampala office to find out what extras would be applicable on the fare and which US airport could be reached on which dates, the sales agent then suggested that it would be best if one comes to their offices in the city to discuss it as giving the information by phone may be ‘complicated.’

Consumer watchdogs in the EU have now banned misleading advertising by airlines, some of which promoted a 1 Euro fare but then loaded huge amounts on to it for all sorts of charges, leaving honest consumers befuddled over what to believe. Calls have been getting louder in Eastern Africa, too, to ban such types of advertising and compel airline companies to only give the rate which a traveler has to pay, inclusive of taxes, fuel surcharge and other add-ons created by the airlines, airports, and regulators.

EMIRATES TO COMPLETE MOVE TO TERMINAL 3
The Kampala office of Dubai’s award-winning airline has now confirmed that commencing on November 11, the fourth and final phase of their move to the new terminal will begin. The remaining flights to India, Asia, and Australia will move arrivals and departures to link with all other flights already operating out of the new terminal. The move so far has been without hiccups and problems, a vote of confidence for the excellent planning and preparation, unlike the botched Terminal 5 situation of BAA and BA earlier in the year in Heathrow.

Travelers from Uganda and the rest of Eastern Africa will then enjoy unprecedented short ways, increased comfort in the new departure lounges, and state-of-the-art shopping while in transit when flying with Emirates.

FUEL SHORTAGE HITS AGAIN
(Sunday, November 2) – While over 100 fuel tankers are reportedly ‘stuck’ at the border as a result of a driver’s strike and the alleged, snail’s-pace clearance by customs, Kampala and other urban centers have run short of fuel, and the international airport, too, is said to be affected with no new deliveries for the past two days. This, however, could not be independently confirmed by the time of going to press.

The fuel companies predictably blame delayed clearances at the border for fuel coming from the main, end-of-pipeline depot in Eldoret / Kenya, and the wildcat strike of drivers protesting against the appalling conditions of the customs, parking yard at Malaba, of course, has added further woes to the supply situation in the country and beyond.
As a result of the shortage, said to last several more days at least, prices have gone up again, and fuel stations began to ration their remaining stocks, selling only small quantities to customers or even closing for the day.

Safari operators normally have sufficient stock at their depots to operate booked safaris without running out of fuel, but visitors arriving imminently in Uganda are advised to consult their agents in case of any doubts.

Meanwhile, President Museveni demanded an immediate report on the border, cargo, clearance situation from the Uganda Revenue Authority, having summoned earlier in the week several cabinet ministers to Malaba to investigate the terrible state of the parking yards, after hearing complaints from the drivers when driving to Nairobi for the IGAD Summit.

SITUATION UPDATE ALONG THE UGANDA / RWANDA / CONGO BORDER
In view of the present situation in Eastern Congo, and the increased flow of refugees from that area to the borders with Uganda and Rwanda in search of safe haven, the traveling public can be reassured that tight security is in place along the Uganda / Congo border to prevent any transgression by Congolese soldiers or their allied militias. Refugees reaching official border posts are being processed in an orderly fashion as present resources on site permit.

There is no danger for tourist visitors to the gorilla national parks of Bwindi, Mgahinga, or for visitors to the Rwandan gorilla national park, where sufficient security measures are in place already to ensure the safety of visiting tourists.

The Rwandan and Ugandan government are closely monitoring the situation across the border in the Congo to ensure that no harm comes to their own citizens or visitors to the two countries traveling at present to or from the national parks in the area. It is, however, recommended to use only duly-licensed tour and safari operators when traveling to the national parks in the border areas as they are kept fully informed of developments and can react swiftly in case of any changes in the situation.

KING’S SELECTION DELAYED BY COURT
(Thursday, October 30) – The court action brought by a minority of the Busoga Kingdom’s chiefs has resulted in an interim order to halt the selection of a new king, initially due for the end of October, until the merit of the case itself has been heard and decided by the Constitutional Court in Kampala. This may mean a lengthy delay in selecting a new king from amongst the qualified chiefdoms and is likely to anger the kingdom’s subjects to no end.

However, the majority section of the kingdom, and in particular officials organizing the selection process, claimed not to have been served with any court order and would go ahead with the process unless formally receiving the court papers. This column will continue to update readers on the situation.

CHIEF’S ASSEMBLY SELECTS NEW ‘KYABAZINGA’
(Friday, October 31) – The assembled chiefs, three of them inexplicably missing, went ahead on October 31 and selected a new ‘Kyabazinga’ or King for the Busoga Kingdom. They gave their vote of support to Prince Edward Columbus Wambuzi Muloki, a son of the late king, who formally accepted to serve his subjects and assume the throne.

One of the contestants walked out of the assembly in obvious protest, complaining about the strong presence of security personnel around the venue, but he could not change the outcome of the selection process.

The newly-anointed king was then driven to Busoga’s main township of Jinja and given a rousing welcome by the population there. This column will inform readers when the formal coronation ceremony will take place.

No comments could be received in regard of an earlier Constitutional Court ruling from Kampala, as intimated in an earlier column item, and there is some speculation that the chief’s assembly had not been formally served with the injunction before embarking on the selection of their new king.

MTN KAMPALA MARATHON ‘FULLY BOOKED’
The 2008 edition of the annual Kampala marathon had a brief registration extension, which has since closed to allow for processing of the data and production of tags for the participants. The race will take place on Sunday, November 23, and several key, traffic arteries, as well as parts of the city center, will be fully or partly closed for ordinary traffic to allow the race to take place without danger to the participants. Over 10,000 runners are expected in what has become one of the biggest, sporting spectacles in the country.

TELECOM COMPANIES TO SHARE MASTS
The ongoing telecom’s boom in Uganda had a visual effect across the country, with urban neighborhoods and many hills around the city and elsewhere now dotted with transmission masts. The Uganda Communications Commission has now concluded that this is no longer desirable and issued a statement last week that in the future the telecom companies will be compelled to share masts to minimize fresh building to parts of the country still in need of coverage. A commendable initiative says this correspondent, which was long overdue and which is likely to keep expansion cost down for the benefit of many Ugandans, in particular in rural areas.

KENYA AIRWAYS PROFITS DROP SHARPLY
Faced with the fall-out of the political, post-election violence earlier in the year and subsequent near collapse of tourism and passenger numbers, the Kenyan national airline is now faced with sharply-lower profits, down by nearly two third for the first half of their financial year compared to 12 months ago, when all pointed to another record-breaking year. Besides the loss of revenue, following the situation in the country, fuel bills escalated by over 70 percent in spite of sensible fuel hedging.

The airline, however, is committed to modernizing its fleet and is set to exchange their ageing B767 fleet with the modern B787 ‘Dreamliner,’ as and when this plane eventually becomes available. This column has, in the past, extensively reported on the Boeing Corporation’s production problems with this aircraft and the additional strain put on them through the recent strikes. Kenya Airways management also made reference at their recent annual general meeting to the likely delays of the B787 but pointed out that alternatives are being sought and explored to, if necessary, lease more fuel-efficient aircraft as a stop-gap measure while waiting for their turn to take delivery of the ordered aircraft. It was also learned that at least two, new B737-800 will now join their fleet late, due to the nearly two-month-long strike at Boeing.

Meanwhile, and in stark contrast, a tell-tale sign of what Kenya Airways could have achieved without the political violence is Ethiopian Airlines who has just announced a sharp rise by over one-third of their year on year profits, adding evidence that well-managed, African airlines can indeed make a success as other global giants struggle. Watch this column for updates.

KENYA CELEBRATES OBAMA WIN WITH PUBLIC HOLIDAY
The US election victory of Barack Obama, now due to become the 44th President of the United States in late January, has also spurned celebrations across Kenya. Kenyan President Mwai Kibaki promptly announced a public holiday for Thursday this week to allow the Kenyan people to celebrate the success of one (half) of their own. Obama was born to a Kenyan father and a US citizen and brought up by his mother and later his maternal grandmother, while the father’s family continues to live in Nyanza province in Western Kenya.

Global media were camped at the home village of Kogelo, near the city of Kisumu, and once the victory became clear, a bull was slaughtered for the entire family, friends, clan, and other well wishers attending the live broadcasts on satellite television. Pictures from the outburst of joyous ululations by the entire village went around the world, just as soon as Obama’s election victory became evident, as he rapidly accumulated the required number of votes in the Electoral College.

His election victory is also thought to attract many more visitors to Western Kenya in particular in coming years, not only from the US but from across the world, probably making it a place of near pilgrimage for the global Obama fan club. Good news for Kenya and hopefully also a reminder that a proper democratic process simply cannot be beaten when it comes to elections.

LAMU FESTIVAL SET FOR NOVEMBER 28 – 30
The ancient town of Lamu is getting ready for their annual Swahili Cultural Festival at the end of November. The UNESCO World Heritage Site township will celebrate age-old customs and give a platform for the performing arts of music and handicrafts. Both local and regional artists are expected to perform and show their skills while open air restaurants will prepare the traditional coastal foods for visitors. Scheduled flights to Lamu from Nairobi are available on Kenya Airways, Fly540, Air Kenya, and Safari Link, and air charters can also be arranged from Mombasa and Malindi.

TANZANIA GETS NEW WILDLIFE LAW
News was received that the Tanzanian parliament was discussing a new wildlife bill with very substantial changes compared to the present status. One of the major changes will be the formation of a professional anti-poaching ‘Wildlife Protection Unit,’ which will be better equipped and better trained to meet the challenges of today’s often commercial type of poaching. Also contained in the new bill are stronger enforcement measures for encroachers of wetlands and cattle herders entering national parks and game reserves. The new bill is expected to be presented to parliament soon after ongoing, stakeholder consultations have been concluded.

RWANDA AVIATION TRAINS TO ICAO STANDARDS
A four-day, training course last week educated staff of Rwandair, other airlines, and from the Civil Aviation Authority on the latest procedures and standards as prescribed by IATA and ICAO, in order to improve aviation safety and security. High-ranking sources from Rwandair commended the effort and vowed to continue upgrading skills and staff capabilities until they reach the highest standards and attain IOSA certification for the airline.

RWANDA TO PLANT 40 MILLION TREES
During the forthcoming national, tree-planting week, Rwandan society is expected to plant as many as 40 million tree seedlings to boost environmental protection and replant forest areas where an excess of trees were cut in the past. Tree cover extends presently to about 20 percent, but governmental policy expects to raise this to about 30 percent in 2020, a tall target, but achievable.

RWANDA – TANZANIA RAILWAY WORKS TO START NEXT YEAR
A study financed by the African Development Bank has underscored the political intent of the countries involved to begin construction work for the planned railway between Tanzania’s inland port of Ishaka to Rwanda’s capital, Kigali, and then on to Burundi. The project, said to be costing in excess of US$4 billion at current prices, would take at least 5 years to complete. Once ready, the cost element of transportation in goods will fall from the present whopping 40 percent to just 5 percent, making imported items more affordable for the land-locked countries of Rwanda and Burundi. Presently, besides air cargo, all goods for import and export have to be transported by road, mostly via Uganda, and the railway to the alternative Indian Ocean port of Dar es Salaam would create a second viable transit axis.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

AFRICAN LEADERS CALL FOR EASING OF TRAVEL

AFRICAN LEADERS CALL FOR EASING OF TRAVEL
The first tripartite summit of its kind last week in Kampala, which brought 26 countries of the East African Community, COMESA (Common Market for Eastern and Southern Africa) and South African Development Community together, also addressed the issue of easing travel between African countries. Visa requirements, not optimal even for visiting tourists, are at best restrictive and at worst obstructive towards the citizens of these countries, when intending to visit other African nations for business or pleasure. The ultimate aim was to establish a ‘Visa free zone’ for citizens of the trading blocks, a far vision however as even within for instance COMESA itself a broad range of travel and Visa restrictions still apply, in particular by some countries like The Sudan. Watch this space.

DAYTIME LOADSHEDDING ENDS
After further substantial investments in heavy fuel oil thermal power plants, the national electricity distribution company Umeme has now announced the end of day time power cuts. Heavy fuel oil plants have been introduced to progressively substitute the much more expensive diesel propelled plants, a smart move in view of the high cost of diesel. This will be good news for domestic and industrial users of electricity. Evening loadshedding, when demand is at its highest, will however continue for the foreseeable future until the new Bujagali hydro electric plant will come on line, expected to be latest in 2011. However, usually well informed sources have pointed out that the construction of the delayed hydro electric plant at Karuma Falls needs to be sped up, as by the time Bujagali goes on line the demand for electricity will have sharply risen and more capacity must be brought on line in view of revised demand projections, or else load shedding would be bound to continue for some more time to come.

Meanwhile it was learned that NEMA has yet to approve the application of Tullow Oil for the construction of their planned refinery and thermal power plant, as no specific location has been given, although the wider area has been defined during public hearings over the past weeks. Environmental watchdogs in Uganda have also been pointing out that they are NOT categorically standing in the way of oil production but only want to see best global practises introduced to avoid lasting damage to the environment.

UGANDA WILDLIFE AUTHORITY SEEKS NEW INVESTORS
UWA has now advertised new opportunities for investors in the safari and services sector. Prime opportunity exists in the Kidepo Valley National Park, where the ‘old’ and now derelict Grand Katarum Lodge is available for a long-term concession. The property is strategically located in rocky outcrops overlooking the Nablus Valley, where for much of the year much of the game is concentrated as water is readily available while draught bites in other parts of the park. A camp for re-development (Sebitole) is also available at the primate Kibaale National Park, where upmarket accommodation is now greatly desired by UWA. A similar opportunity for managing the Kapkwai Cottages within the Mt. Elgon National Park has also become available. For Lake Mburo National Park UWA is seeking a concessionaire to introduce and operate boats on the lake for bird and game spotting from the water and the fifth opportunity will be to create and manage a new trail within the Rwenzori Mountain National Park. More information about these opportunities can be found at the UWA website: www.uwa.or.ug or can be obtained by interested bidders via email from [email protected].

Bid documents are available at the UWA head offices in Kampala at a cost of 50.000/- Uganda shillings, at present exchange rates just over US$25. Deadline is December 3 this year at 1100 am sharp, whereafter the documents will be publicly opened in the presence of bidders or their representatives. NO electronic submissions will be acceptable to UWA, it has been pointed out and all bids must be delivered in original format, duly marked with bidders details.

FUEL PRICES GO UP ONCE AGAIN
After dragging their feet for weeks at end in bringing fuel prices down, while the cost of crude oil around the world collapsed from an all time high of nearly US$150 a barrel to less than half of that, the fuel companies have now incurred the wrath of the people as they started raising the pump prices again. This time they are citing the falling value of the Uganda Shilling against the US dollar, now hovering near the 2.000 mark, to raise prices after greedily exploiting the public for and extended period of time by keeping petrol, diesel and kerosene up to their former highs with little reduction at all. General comment from affected people: “shame on them” … as if the big fuel companies were at all bothered about this!

BRUSSELS AIRLINES ADDS CODE SHARE DESTINATIONS IN BRITAIN
The recent entry of SN into the Lufthansa family has born prompt results. The airline has now signed agreements with British airline bmi, also a member of the Lufthansa family and reportedly now due for a full takeover by LH, and will subsequently offer travellers from Uganda such additional routes like Edinburgh, Nottingham and Leeds, operated by bmi. In turn bmi will add their flight numbers to such destinations operated by SN from Brussels like Birmingham, Bristol, Manchester and Newcastle. Brussels Airlines presently flies four times a week from the European capital to Entebbe via Nairobi.

SKAL KAMPALA WINS DEVELOPMENT AWARD
Skalleagues from the Kampala chapter 611 returned from the Skal World Congress in Taipei with the news, that the club was recognised for membership development, having added a whopping 27 percent new members to the chapter in the past business year. Club president Ms. Kaine Sabiti, who is also the General Manager of the Amadeus office in Kampala, announced the good news during the recent club fellowship, which was attended by over 40 members.

EMIRATES MOVES AFRICA FLIGHTS TO NEW TERMINAL
Following the successful first phase of moving their flight handling to the new purpose built Terminal Three at Dubai’s International Airport, all flights to and from Africa, including of course the daily service to and from Entebbe, have now moved to their new home. Some leading travel agents were asked for comments and said they and their clients are excited about the change and the new terminal will provide more space, quicker transit and superb shopping opportunities.

Meanwhile, the airline has taken delivery of their second A380, according to airline sources, and will now commence daily flights on this type of aircraft from Dubai to New York, making travel on Emirates from Entebbe via Dubai to the US even more enjoyable.

The Emirates Kampala office has also confirmed that the long awaited non stop flights from Dubai to Los Angeles have finally commenced on October 26, adding another attractive destination for their faithful travellers and giving Ugandans yet more options when choosing their airline. Special introductory fares have been launched across Emirates’ Eastern African destinations to stimulate traffic. No dates have been released yet to start their planned flights to San Francisco though.

HEAVY RAINS TAKE TOLL ON ROADS
The ongoing heavy and in parts of the country very heavy rains have now taken another “victim” when the main road from Kampala to the West of the country was partly swept away, some 80 km from the capital. Culverts seem to have collapsed causing the rest of the roadbed to gradually wash away, leaving a gaping hole covering half the width of the highway. Emergency repairs commenced more or less immediately, this being a key traffic axis into the West of the country but also to the hinterland nations like Rwanda, Burundi and Eastern Congo, all of which depend on free flow of traffic to transport goods and people.

Meanwhile, letters to the editors of the daily newspapers also complain about monster potholes once again opening up in Kampala, some of them notably on recently reconstructed roads. Even the ‘road’ to this correspondent’s residence, graded a few weeks ago after years of neglect, is again converting into a riverbed full of ruts and gullies. The annual long rains, a blessing and a curse all at once.

GLOBAL TOURISM REACHES 900 MILLION MARK – FACING UNCERTAIN FUTURE
As the global travel market marked passing the 900 million mark for 2007, according to UNWTO figures released recently, arrivals in Africa still stand at a measly 44 million travellers, in spite of outperforming the rest of the world with a 7+ percent growth rate for last year as opposed to the average growth of about 6.5 percent globally. The UNWTO however expressed their concern over growth rates for global tourism in 2009 in view of the present financial crisis and key economies sliding into a recession, which may influence the travel pattern over the next 12 – 24 months.
Several Sub-Saharan African destinations turned in sterling performances again with double digit growth, including Uganda which added just under 20 percent extra visitors, aided by the Commonwealth Summit being held in Kampala a year ago. The one million arrival mark for Uganda is therefore considered possible over the next two years, which would mark a watershed for tourism in the country – in spite of continued governmental ‘neglect’ as a leading tourism operative put it during the week when discussing the issue. Watch this space for future updates.

KENYA AIRWAYS ADDS MORE CHINA FLIGHTS
The Kenyan national airline has now confirmed that they have added three extra flights to Guangzhou / China, besides the three flights already operating via Bangkok. The additional capacity of the direct flights will cater for greater cargo uplifts but also the additional demand for seats by traders in particular, many of whom have shifted much of their buying to China, whereas previously they imported goods via the United Arab Emirates.

Meanwhile, no confirmation could be obtained from the airline over the anticipated delivery dates of their ordered B787 Dreamliner in the face of the long strike at Boeing and production problems.

KLM ADDS CAPACITY ON TANZANIA ROUTE
The Dutch airline recently announced the introduction of a larger capacity B777-300 on their route to Kilimanjaro (Arusha) and Dar es Salaam from Amsterdam for flights on Friday and Sunday, adding a further 130 seats a week to cater for risen demand. KLM is flying daily from Holland to Tanzania, bringing in a large number of holiday makers who come to Tanzania for the world renowned wildlife experience but also to visit the beaches and the islands, most notably Zanzibar. The move is an expression of confidence in the destination and bound to have other competitors too look at a suitable reaction.

The plane was renamed ‘Serengeti’ to assist in the global marketing of Tanzania as a tourist destination, which the airline is planning in conjunction with the Tanzanian Tourist Board.

MWEKA WILDLIFE COLLEGE HOLDS GRADUATION
The highly acclaimed ‘Mweka College of African Wildlife Management’ – a centre of excellence within the East African Community’s tertiary educational framework – has last week held its 44th graduation ceremony. The institute has over the years become a magnet for those intending to start hands on training in wildlife management and many of the certificate and diploma holders from Mweka have gone on to attain degrees and even doctorates. Graduates from the institute are much sought after in the region as wildlife management bodies’ aim at further professionalising their workforce.

ARUSHA GETS NEW HOTEL
The owner of the Impala Hotel in central Arusha and the Ngurdoto Mountain Lodge, Mr. Mrema, has now formally opened his latest hotel venture, the Naura Springs Hotel. Although the facility had a soft opening ahead of the ATA and Leon Sullivan Summits, more work had to be done before officially cutting the tape last week. The five star facility is conveniently located near the Arusha International Conference Centre, but also offers substantial meeting facilities in several larger and smaller halls, catering for up to 600 delegates at a go.

Personal favourites of this correspondent, when in Arusha, remain ‘The Arusha Hotel’ or the ‘Rivertrees Country Inn’ at Usa River just outside of Arusha enroute to the international airport, both of which are reknown for their personal service and traditional hospitality. Visit www.rivertrees.com or www.thearushahotel.com for more information on these two fine properties.

KIGALI CASINO FAILS TO OPEN
The first ever casino in Kigali, and Rwanda for that matter, did not open as anticipated last week. Usually well informed sources attribute the delay to the non arrival of some vital equipment, which is reportedly still in transit or awaiting customs clearance. Location of the new gambling facility is within the new Top Tower Hotel. This column will however report the opening, as and when it finally happens.

CONGO, OH CONGO – WILL THERE EVER BE PEACE (update)
Since filing this report, first published by eTN on 27th/28th October [www.www.eturbonews.com/Africa] confirmation was received that the UN forces commander had indeed resigned his post and ‘off the record’ comments obtained from UN sources in Kigali also mirrored the reasons given in above article as correct. It was also learned that the Kinshasa regime had dispatched a special envoy to President Kagame of Rwanda to seek a bilateral meeting over the volatile situation they caused across Eastern Congo. Regime troops are also said to be in a rowdy retreat from the Eastern main city of Goma, looting in the process with MONUC as usual standing by idle. The UN force is reportedly also in a standoff with the local population who demanded protection from the regime’s rag tag troops and their militia cohorts and resorted to blocking entrances to UN compounds and stoning vehicles and offices in their anger.

NATO STARTS PIRATE HUNT
After receiving a long overdue mandate from the UN’s Security Council, North Atlantic Treaty Organization naval forces based in Djibouti and operating around the Horn of Africa have commenced their hunt for pirates along the Somali coastline. Regular ship hijackings have caused an outcry by the global shipping community prompting the action by coalition and other naval ships, who joined the operation.

Besides seeking out the pirates nests the ships will now also escort supply vessels heading for the port of Mogadishu, ensuring regular supplies to the city as well as the AU peace keeping forces based in and around the Somali capital. The recent InterGovernmental Authority on Development. summit in Nairobi also endorsed the decision to deploy naval forces to curb and eliminate piracy along the Horn of Africa and the port of Mombasa will likely offer logistical support for navy vessels.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

UGANDA GETS BIG VOTE FOR UN SECURITY COUNCIL SEAT

UGANDA GETS BIG VOTE FOR UN SECURITY COUNCIL SEAT
As intimated some weeks ago, Uganda – on behalf of Africa – was standing for elections to become a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council for the next two years. During the vote late last week Uganda gathered 181 votes out of a total of 192, a very sound, if not outright overwhelming vote of confidence about the standing this East African nation nowadays enjoys in the international arena.

Uganda’s term will commence on 01st January 2009 and run until 31st December 2010. I congratulate and salute the nation for attaining this great honor.

ARRIVAL FIGURES FOR 2007 AGAIN UP
Figures finally released to the media by the Uganda Bureau of Statistics for 2008 overall arrivals were now given as 883.230, putting the “magic” one million arrival mark within reach over the coming years. No details on earnings from tourism however were available as yet and neither were any quarterly or half year figures for 2008, so watch this space.

NDEGE JUU TAKES TO THE AIR
“Up with the bird” is the plain translation from Kiswahili into English and also the name of Uganda’s latest domestic airline, now based at the fully refurbished ‘Old Terminal’ at the Kajjansi airfield. The small airline is specializing in banner advertising, but is also offering sightseeing flights and even charters. The principal promoters of the new airline – licensed in March and recently awarded an AOC under the sharply tightened new CAA rules – are Capt. Emma Carter, who used to fly several years for the Kampala Aero Club and Flight Training Centre, and Tim Cooper, who is the co-owner of Bulago Island.

The young airline is presently operating a Fuji FA-200 but planning to add more aircraft in due course. Visit their website at www.ndegejuu.com for more information.

FOREST REPLANTING UNDERWAY
Following alarming reports in the local media over shrinking forest cover across the country, some good news were received from areas surrounding Kibaale national park. Information availed to this column indicates that some 150.000 indigenous tree seedlings were planted in recent months with the support of the National Forest Authority. NFA sources also say that over the past three years nearly a million indigenous tree seedlings were planted countrywide in an effort to restore forests.
Ugandans, bringing the first major job bonanza for qualified young people.

SHILLING PLUMMETS
The global financial fall out has now also reached Eastern Africa, where the currencies have taken a hit. In Uganda alone the value of the shilling versus the dollar has plummeted in an unprecedented way from the mid 1600 range some weeks ago to nearly 2000, as remittances from Ugandans living and working abroad are reducing and orders for exports like flowers, fruits, vegetables and fish are slackening from the main consumer markets in Europe. The trend is thought to benefit tourist visitors however, who will get more value for their dollars. At the same time however the value of the Euro and the UK Pound has equally dropped, reflecting the global trend in currency markets.

FUEL PRICES REMAIN HIGH
Frustration is setting in with motorists in Uganda as fuel prices remain high in spite of a sustained fall of the price of a barrel of crude oil on the international market, now down over 60 percent since nearly touching 150 US Dollars a few months ago. Fuel companies however have not passed on the savings to consumers, while they were swift in raising prices at the pumps when the crude oil price went rocketing.

KENYA NEARS NEW POLICY AND LEGAL FRAMEWORK
The Kenyan Tourism Minister last week announced plans to look into the establishment of a tourism business council, which would be expected to advise government from time to time on matters concerning the sector’s development as well as current affairs and matters arising. The promise was made during a tourism policy consultative workshop, which was aimed at advancing the new Kenyan tourism policy towards its completion. The workshop also discussed the status of the tourism draft legislation, which would bring the Kenyan tourism sector’s legislative framework into the 21st century.

During the proceedings the minister also intimated that the pending new telecommunications bill would also cater for e-transactions, which would allow credit card payments for bookings and tourist services in Kenya in a regulated and secure way.

Uganda published her tourism policy in 2003 and finally passed the new tourism bill earlier this year, after it was inexplicably kept pending since 2005 without much progress in between. The tourism industry in Uganda is now also awaiting the new regulations to be promulgated by the minister, which should have happened shortly after the bill was signed into law by President Museveni. No sound reasons could be established however why the regulations are not published yet and what is again holding up a crucial component governing the sector’s development.

KENYA OPENS ABASUBA CULTURAL MUSEUM
Mfangano Island in Lake Victoria is the location of a recently opened cultural museum, celebrating the Abasuba traditions in a formal setting. The effort is part of Kenya’s drive to diversify tourism and open up new circuits and attractions for the expected visitor boom resuming after the post election violence early in the year. Should Senator Obama win the US presidential elections on November 03, the area – Nyanza Province – is expected to rake in tourist Dollars and Euros from curious visitors, as Obama’s father hailed from the area and part of his “Kenyan” family still live there, making it a unique ‘tourist attraction’ for Obama’s global “fan club.”

AIR ARABIA TO START NAIROBI FLIGHTS
This weekend will see Air Arabia, a UAE based low cost carrier, starting their long awaited flights between Sharjah and Nairobi, adding pressure on fares on the lucrative route to the heart of the Gulf. Presently Kenya Airways, Emirates and Qatar Airways are flying to various destinations in the Gulf region from Nairobi, but with Sharjah only a few kilometres from Dubai, the new flights are thought to become an instant success with money conscious travellers.

KENYA TO BENEFIT FROM EXPEDIA CONTRACT
Vintage Africa has now signed an agreement with global e-marketing giant Expedia to market products from Kenya and the wider East African region. Hotels like the Nairobi Hilton and the hotels and lodges of Fairmont Kenya can now be accessed via Expedia, which increases global exposure and helps selling the East African region around the world.

FLY 540 EXPANSION TO TANZANIA ON HOLD
Politics are suspected to be preventing Fly540 to bring low fares and reliable services into the Tanzanian market, for the time being at least. Issues arising from restrictions placed through the bilateral air services agreement seem to suggest that all available slots from Kenya are taken up already, and Tanzania being rather notorious in erecting non-tariff barriers for airlines from the region appears to stick to their guns not allowing Fly540 on the route. The airline however seems to have also lodged an application in Tanzania to obtain an air services license and commence operations from there, as they have successfully done in Uganda already.
That all said, the intransigence of regional aviation regulators, as often mentioned in this column before, is legendary and their approach to integration is largely one of holding on to their little fiefdoms instead of opening up the regulatory regime across the East African Community. The Yamoussoukro Agreement on aviation, but also the respective clauses of COMESA (Tanzania is a member of SADC and therefore not bound by COMESA rules) should dictate a more proactive regulatory regime, but at least for the time being the bureaucrats seem to think otherwise.

AIR TANZANIA PLANES FUTURE UNCERTAIN
Reports have surfaced in Tanzania that the two leased B737 aircraft are due for heavy maintenance any time soon, putting the schedules of the airline in doubt unless they can secure replacements in good time. Information from usually well-informed aviation sources in Dar es Salaam also indicates that the two aircraft’s leases are due for renewal too or else the Boeings may have to be returned to the lessors abroad.

EMBATTLED ‘TAZARA’ RAILWAY BOARD SEEKS CULPRIT
The company’s board of directors has now put much of the blame for the company’s precarious financial and operational position on the CEO (since suspended), accusing him during the week of misappropriation of up to 10 billion Tanzania Shillings. The company has been in the news of late over a series of misfortunes, overshadowed by the developments over the Rift Valley Railway Corporation at the time, which meanwhile seems back on the straight and narrow after a total overhaul of management, board and shareholders, which included a substantial reduction of former lead investor’s Sheltam of South Africa’s overall shareholding.
The Tanzania – Zambia Railway however is now reeling from the impact of the financial losses and the board, also presently seeking a strategic investor, is now seemingly hell bent to blame someone. A strike also reportedly erupted last week but was quelled when the board gave in to worker’s demands and re-instated the acting CEO whom they also sought to get rid of.

The railway was built by the Chinese government in the late 1960s and assumed operations in the mid 1970s.

ZANZIBAR TOURISM TURNS TO INDIGENOUS INVESTORS
Information was received last week that over 250 Zanzibaris have been registered as significant investors in the tourism industry, putting more local interest into the sector. No data on the type of these investments or the value of the investments could be obtained at the time of going to press but it is evident that more and more local investors have of late committed themselves to the tourism industry, reducing the reliance on foreign investments.

PLANS FOR NEW RWANDA CONVENTION CENTRE READY
The architectural drawings for the new Kigali International Convention Centre have been completed, it was revealed earlier in the week in Kigali. Construction for the centre, which will also include a hotel, shopping arcades and an office park, is due to kick on in February 2009 and expected to take two years towards completion. The centre will be able to cater for meetings, conferences, conventions and events with up to 2.500 participants at a time.

Meanwhile it was also learned, that Rwanda will only pass a half year budget for the period of January until June 2009, where after they will move their annual financial year, in line with other East African Community countries, to the July – June period.

RWANDAIR RESUMES JOHANNESBURG FLIGHTS
As indicated in this column some weeks ago, Rwandair has indeed now commenced flights again from Kigali to Johannesburg, operating three times a week at present. Sources from within the airline however did confirm that more flights could be added in coming months, subject to traffic growth on the route. Rwandair had to book their passengers to South Africa over the past six months on other airlines, often connecting through other airports. The same source did however not comment on the date for the announcement of the airline’s partnership with Fly540 Aviation, which is according to unconfirmed information nearly ready to sign. Follow this column for regular updates on aviation news from the entire region.

SOUTHERN SUDAN SET FOR NEW TOURISM LAW AND REGULATIONS
The Ministry for Wildlife Conservation and Tourism has now formally signed a contract to develop their new tourism legislation and subsequent regulations, aimed to provide a comprehensive framework based on which development partners and donors can then assist in institutional capacity building to put the re-emerging sector on a sound growth path.

The ministry has already, with internally generated resources, started to document some of the main attractions on DVD to eventually prepare a marketing tool for the promotion of tourism, first in the region and then further abroad.
Presently however there is no tourism marketing body in place and wildlife management is still part of the ministry itself, rather than operating in an autonomous or semi-autonomous setting as most counterparts in the region now do.

JUBA INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT CONSTRUCTION STALLS
After the initial contractor for the new terminal building in Juba at the international airport was ‘sacked’ – other sources allege they simply disappeared after obtaining some substantial payments, a new search is going on to find a new contractor. Work meanwhile has come to a standstill on the new passenger terminal located right next to the present terminal, which is now overcrowded whenever more than one flight arrive and depart at the same time.

JUBA BRIDGE ACROSS THE NILE FIXED
The much utilised bridge across the river Nile in Juba, one section of which had collapsed over two years ago when an heavily overloaded truck brought part of the structure down, has now been re-opened for traffic in both directions. During the period of repair traffic was strictly one way regulated, slowing down entry into the city as well as traffic leaving Juba. The main road across the bridge leads to Nimule, before crossing into Uganda, thus forming a major supply route for Juba and the rest of the Southern Sudan.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

Welcome to Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report – the following stories are the latest news and updates from the region.

AIR UGANDA MAY ADD KHARTOUM FLIGHTS VIA JUBA

Welcome to Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report – the following stories are the latest news and updates from the region.

AIR UGANDA MAY ADD KHARTOUM FLIGHTS VIA JUBA

While in Juba on assignment this columnist learned from usually well informed governmental and aviation sources, that Air Uganda, in conjunction with a Southern Sudanese registered airline, now intends to fly initially two or three times a week from Juba to Khartoum, likely using a ‘wet lease’ arrangements to avoid a conflict over traffic rights on the domestic route.
Sudan Airways, the national airline based in Khartoum, has been banned from flying since one of their aircraft crashed on landing a few weeks ago while coming from Amman, leaving the Juba route at the mercy of one off operators without the assurance of global safety standards being applied.

Should indeed Air Uganda be able to pull off the deal, at least it would then assure the travelling public between the Southern capital and the national capital to have regular connections. Watch this space to stay informed.

EMIRATES OPENS NEW TERMINAL

Uganda travellers will have to wait a little longer still to travel through the brand new Terminal 3 at Dubai’s International Airport, as the opening is being played out in several phases. Initial reports from Dubai are such that the first flights earlier in the week were handled flawlessly and the transfer of selected flights to their ‘new home’ has been on course during the week.

This is of course in stark contrast to the massively bodged opening of Terminal 5 in Heathrow which caused huge embarrassment to British Airways and Britain in fact and lost BA many customers, even from Uganda, who were caught up in the nightmare scenario then.

Emirates, which connects Uganda daily with Dubai and the rest of the world on Airbus A340 aircraft, has said that flights from and to Africa will move to the new terminal in phase two of the terminal changeover, due to commence shortly. It was also learned that the A380 service to New York, to which Ugandans can now connect in Dubai, will be going ‘daily’ towards the end of the month, a long awaited development and delayed due to the late delivery of additional A380 aircraft from Airbus Industries.

Well done indeed and one of many reasons why Emirates has become one of the ‘world’s favourite airlines’.

TARMAC FOR ROAD TO PARK

During a visit to the Rukungiri district in Western Uganda as part of his nationwide poverty alleviation tour, has President Museveni announced that the recently completed magnificent road to the area will be extended towards Kanungu (where traffic branches off to the Bwindi Gorilla National Park), Kihihi and the Congo DR border point at Ishasha. This will allow for faster and easier access of tourists to the Southern sector of Queen Elizabeth National Park but equally important provide farmers in the area an outlet to reach the urban markets across the country via the new road. Driving time to the Bwindi and Queen Elizabeth parks may reduce, once the road extension is completed, by more than an hour, giving tourist visitors more time inside the parks or allowing for visits to cultural attractions en route to the park, making best use of the time gained. The park road between Katunguru and Ishasha however, which crosses the Queen Elizabeth National Park from one end to the other and traverses the Maramagambo Forest, is still in great need of repairs and upgrades.

POWER PLANT DEVELOPER PULLS OUT, GOVERNMENT TAKES OVER

The second new hydro electric power plant developer, NORPAK, has just announced that they are pulling out of the project following disagreements with the World Bank, without giving more specific reasons however. The project was in an on / off mode since the first proposals were floated over a decade ago. Government however was swift in stepping into the breach and announced it would acquire the plans, designs and intellectual property from NORPAK to ensure the project would be developed within the expected time frame. It is likely that a restricted bidding process might unfold soon towards finding a new developer, but it is equally likely that government may go it alone. It was also learned that the designs of NORPAK, which wanted to build a ‘tunnel’ version as opposed to the highly contentious dam type, would be re-examined with the aim to raising the output of power from the projected 200 MW to as much as 600 MW. It is not clear at present how this is to be achieved however, so watch this space.

FORESTS KEEP SHRINKING

The latest in a series of reports on the status of forests in Uganda has again underscored an alarming trend of fast reduction in tree cover across the country. The State Minister for Environment was quoted having said in parliament that: ‘the situation is getting serious and worrying. We have so far lost forest cover equivalent to 28 percent’.

No comparative time frame could however be obtained, during which this reduction is said to have taken place.

The situation appears particularly bad in Northern Uganda, where formerly displaced people, returning to their home areas, are reportedly cutting trees rather indiscriminately for firewood, charcoal burning and construction timber. The National Forest Authority has apparently been given a budget equivalent to 2 million US Dollars for replanting of trees in ‘central forest reserves’, which are managed by the national body, but clearly more has to be done to prevent a further de-forestation and subsequent desertification of the country, which once was green from one end to the other.

Meanwhile, the National Forest Authority has called upon companies with unutilised concessions to either start planting trees in accordance with the agreements or else have their contracts cancelled. Under a joint forest management scheme several applicants had been awarded 49 year long agreements, covering some 600 acres.

TANZANIA’S POWER OUTPUT TO REDUCE – BY LAW

The effects of what appears now to be an ill thought out law, signed into effect in June this year, are now likely to further cut the available power in Tanzania, where only two weeks ago the country was struggling with extensive power cuts, when one of the key power plants developed serious technical problems.

The new law prohibits any and all companies with current contracts as ‘independent power producers’ to re-apply for fresh contracts or have existing contracts renewed for 5 years, leading to the Aggreko plant to be shut down shortly. With it goes a capacity of at least 40 MW, as the company has to terminate operations. The new law came into effect over a scandal in the private power generation sector, which cost several government ministers their jobs at the time. However, the intent of the law overshot its aim and objective and the real effect, already pointed out by independent observers and the power industry at the time now seems set to inflict serious electricity shortages in the country.

Business leaders and associations are now leading the battle to suspend the law or urgently amend it to avoid the un-intended side effects hit the economy at this time of global financial market turmoil and recessionary tendencies around the globe. Watch this space.

NEXT LEON SULLIVAN SUMMIT GOES TO KIGALI

During the week the formal MoU was signed between the summit organizers and the Rwandan government to host the next Leon Sullivan Summit in 2010 in Kigali. The most recent event was held earlier in the year in Arusha, Tanzania and was judged an overwhelming success of the summit’s objectives. No specific dates were available however at the time of going to press.

RWANDA OPTS FOR ENGLISH

In yet another step to put their past firmly behind, Rwanda’s cabinet has now decided to accelerate and increase the teaching of English in schools across the country. English will now be the sole medium of instruction from nursery schools to university. Previously, that is until the 1994 Hutu perpetrated genocide, French and Kinyarwanda were the only two official languages in the country but this has changed over the past nearly 15 years with English substituting French more and more.

The joining of Rwanda of the East African Community and her application to join the Commonwealth have undoubtedly played a role in this significant decision, but rubbing the French nose a little – in view of the strained relations – may be a welcome added ‘benefit’ for the Rwandan leadership.

SOUTHERN SUDAN TOURISM POLICY NEARLY THERE

The long awaited tourism policy for the government of Southern Sudan in Juba is now on its final stretch with ongoing intense consultations amongst public and private sector stakeholders, civil society organizations, NGO’s and development partners leading up towards a final consultative workshop, where the new policy final draft document is due to be presented and adopted. Immediately after that final workshop, which will be held in Juba during the last week of October, the new policy document is then expected to be formally handed over to the Minister of Wildlife Conservation and Tourism for processing and presentation to the Council of Ministers, Government of Southern Sudan. It was also learned that work on a new draft tourism legislation and draft tourism regulations would commence soon afterwards to complete the task of establishing a new policy, legal and regulatory framework for the tourism sector in Southern Sudan.

Meanwhile, the environment portfolio has been taken out of the tourism ministry, leaving it as ‘Ministry of Wildlife Conservation and Tourism’ within the Government of Southern Sudan. The environment department is now part of the Ministry of Housing and the Director General for Environment, Mr. Victor Lotombe also moved to his new ministry in the same position.

FRAGILE CONGO PEACE AT THE BRINK

Fighting has spread again in Eastern Congo during the past week, now also involving areas around Bunia / Ituri. ‘Government’ or better regime forces are coming under pressure there, as they have been in the Goma area, where the Tutsi self protection units of General Nkunda have gone on the offensive, after the regime troops openly sided with the former Hutu militias, which committed the Rwanda genocide in 1994. General Nkunda in fact sent a stark message to the Kinshasa regime that he would take the fight to them, if their attitude and behaviour would not change fundamentally in coming weeks, starting with containing and disarming the Hutu militias. The intransigence and alleged deceit of the Kabila led regime in Kinshasa seems to have brought things to a head, and their open alliance with the killer militias, with the tacit support of the UN MONUC ‘peace keeping’ force is possible now leading to a renewed larger conflict in the torn jungle nation.

Rwanda has in the meantime categorically refuted reports from Kinshasa that Rwandese troops had allegedly entered the DR Congo, a denial supported incidentally by UN observers in the area who found not evidence to that effect.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

ENVIRONMENTALISTS FIND ALLIES IN NORWAY

ENVIRONMENTALISTS FIND ALLIES IN NORWAY
The Norwegian government, with an offer of logistical and advisory support on the table for the country’s nascent oil industry, has now qualified the offer to the delight of the environmental and green lobby. Erik Solheim, the Norwegian minister for International Development and Environment, has reportedly asked the Ugandan government to ensure international best practice when permitting the oil companies to drill near or inside the country’s protected areas, and also transparently deal with oil issues, i.e. open files for public scrutiny to the opposition in parliament, the media and the public at large. It would “otherwise be hard for Norway to support oil drilling against environmental concerns,” the minister was quoted in the local papers. Uganda had requested for bilateral support from Norway some time ago, when oil deposits were initially discovered. Environmental and conservation groups demanding strictest standards when it comes to protected areas have taken heart in their struggle to reach sustainable and lasting agreements over their concerns and the Norwegian support has reportedly re-invigorated the green lobby in their activities.

NEW KING TO BE SELECTED ON OCTOBER 3
Following the passing of the Kyabazinga – or King – of Busoga, the 11-clan chiefs were now given notice to assemble in early October. The constitution of the kingdom requires that a new king is elected by the chiefs within 90 days after the passing, as the kingship in Busoga is not hereditary but changes over time from clan to clan, a clear effort to promote harmony within the kingdom. While some wrangles amongst the clan leaders have already been reported in the local media, the elective process however is expected to follow the laid down rules and regulations and a new Kyabazinga is due to be announced soon after the clan chief meeting.

QATAR AIRWAYS EYEING ENTEBBE
Information was given by a staff of Qatar Airways from Nairobi during a recent visit to Uganda that the airline was considering to add Entebbe to their African destinations in late 2009 or early 2010, as the ‘5 star airline’ was seeking new markets. Presently Emirates flies daily from Dubai to Entebbe and should indeed Qatar Airways commence operations in a year’s time, this would add not only further choices and destinations for travelers but also cargo capacity for Ugandan exports like fresh fish, flowers, fruits and vegetables. The airline presently flies daily from Doha to Nairobi and passengers need to use connecting flights to reach Entebbe, making the journey more expensive and cumbersome. The choice of Entebbe would be a sound vote of confidence in the recent re-developments at the airport and the growing economic strength of the country, now that oil has been discovered. Watch this space.

ARGUMENTS PERSIST OVER FORESTS
Earlier in the week a committee of parliamentarians visited the Mt. Elgon National Park to get first hand information over the resettlement of squatters, who were found inside the park and evicted while others were still to be forced out from the park. Earlier in the year this particular park was a hot topic over park boundaries adjustment, which some of the residents sought, but as the boundaries were only set a few years ago, this was neither judged politically opportune and the president himself then denied a request by a minister traveling with him to the area, as this column had reported at the time.
Meanwhile, the minister responsible for forests has called for the degazetting of at least two forest reserves, due to ‘population pressures in the Rakai area after being confronted by a group of people about to be evicted for living in the forests illegally. Talk of contradictions.

FUEL COST REMAIN HIGH
In spite of the recent fall in the cost of crude oil on the world market, little if any movement of petrol, diesel and kerosene prices was seen across Uganda. The oil companies are now being blamed for profiteering, as they were swift to raise price levels to new record heights, when the global crude oil prices went upwards, but since the global price for a barrel of oil has reduced by over 50 US Dollars since reaching its peak, fuel has still remained at peak levels. No comments could be received from selected petrol companies approached in Kampala and Nairobi at the time of going to press. Inflation has meanwhile come to a halt at just over 17 percent with food prices now stabilizing again and once fuel cost reduces inflation is also expected to drop back into the single digit range. This will also reduce pressure on the power companies using heavy fuel oil and diesel propelled plants to ask for higher tariffs and there may even be some hope that power tariffs may in the medium term reduce again, before the new hydro-electric power plant near Bujagali goes on line.

EMIRATES WEST COAST SERVICES NEWS
News have emerged in Kampala, confirmed by a leading travel agent, that the planned introduction of the Emirates flights to Los Angeles and San Francisco later in the year will be ‘staggered’ and might not be daily flights as initially planned. Flights to LAX and SFO were to commence in late October and December respectively. Airline sources not wishing to be named indicated upon raising the issue with them, that the flights might only operate three times a week during the launch period, as apparently Boeing’s present strike has delayed the delivery of B777 long range models to Emirates, impacting on the route launch and related plans. Emirates has earlier this month taken their first A380 out of their New York service and going daily may also take a little longer, as their second A380 delivery has reportedly been delayed by Airbus Industries by several weeks.

ENTEBBE INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT SECURITY STEPPED UP
It was learned earlier in the week that the “joint anti-terrorism squad” has now joined the present security arrangements at the Entebbe airport, including control of the access gates. The development is a result of having reviewed security measures at the airport and is aimed to strengthen the overall effectiveness at Uganda’s main aviation gateway. Security in the entire Entebbe municipality area has also been stepped up since President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni moved to the rebuilt and refurbished State House in Entebbe and presidential security is now in place, a move welcomed by many.

KENYA AIRWAYS ADDS MADAGASCAR
From the beginning of the coming winter season, three flights per week will be added by KQ from Nairobi to Tananarive / Madagascar. The flights will leave Nairobi at 8:00 am every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday and the return flights will allow passengers from Madagascar convenient connections into most of the KQ network. The airline has not ruled out to increase the number of flights once the service has taken hold and passenger numbers have increased.

FLY540 ADDS ZANZIBAR
The regional low cost airline has now added a daily flight between Nairobi, via Mombasa to Zanzibar following growing demand for affordable air travel on the route. The flight links directly to the morning departure of the airline from Entebbe, allowing for a through connection to either Mombasa or Zanzibar. The cost of a one way ticket from Nairobi is said to be 99 US Dollars, plus regulatory charges but no fares were available at the time of going to press for the Mombasa to Zanzibar sector.

NEW FERRIES FOR MOMBASA
Following the report a few weeks ago, that three out of four ferries had gone unserviceable in one day, causing tourists to miss flights and commuters to miss work and other appointments, the ferry company has now released information that they expect delivery of two new ferries early next year. The new vessels were ordered already in 2004 and the ferry company blamed the delay on court action by an unsuccessful bidder at the time, which caused construction to commence late. The two new vessels are being built in Germany and should hopefully live up to expectations on ‘Made in Germany’ in regard to reliability and durability.

AIR TANZANIA TO GET GOVERNMENT BACKING FOR LOANS
The funds required for the ongoing fleet renewal will be guaranteed by the Tanzanian government to allow the national airline proceed with the additional aircraft acquisitions, it was learned earlier in the week. The grounding of some aircraft last week due to technical problems seems to have triggered the response, in particular as some sources from within the airline blamed government to have reneged on some promises made in regard of financial support. All of d Air Tanzania Corporation Limited (ATCL)’s aircraft are meanwhile back in the air after spare parts arrived and the required repairs were carried out. Meanwhile, the airline has formally launched its Dar es Salaam – Tabora – Kigoma flights earlier in the week, making good of their promise some months ago that with the arrival of their new Bombardier Q 300 aircraft domestic air services would be stepped up again and formerly suspended routes be resumed. ATCL’s CEO used the opportunity to call upon government to make further efforts to rehabilitate and expand domestic airports. Flights will initially operate on Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday.

RWANDA’S ELECTIONS PEACEFUL AND DECISIVE
Rwanda held parliamentary elections early this week, after the month long campaign, held in an overwhelmingly peaceful and transparent environment, concluded the previous weekend. The European Union observer team however was reportedly fighting amongst themselves, with some unnamed observer mission officials from certain countries trying to peddle complaints about the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF)’s election campaign, something however rejected by the delegation leader and other observers. The spat seems to suggest that a hidden agenda was at work by some “observers,” trying to smear President Paul Kagame’s ruling RPF party and casting doubt over their overwhelming election win, which presently stands at 42 out of 53 elective seats for the RPF. The results will ensure that Rwanda will remain firmly on course for further economic growth and predictable domestic policies aimed at further reconciliation. A record number of women were elected to parliament, marking another milestone for equal opportunities development, when the “fairer sex” took over half of all seats. The turn out in Rwanda greatly exceeded 90 percent of registered voters, and Rwandans abroad, including those in Uganda, were also allowed to participate in the elections. Participation by Rwandese in Uganda was reported to be near 100 percent, showing the keen interest in Rwanda national affairs. No interruptions for tourists were encountered during the election period anywhere across the country.

CALTEX WITHDRAWS FROM KIGALI AIRPORT
Bakri, a Saudi Arabian fuel company, has now taken over aviation fuel supplies at the international airport in Kigali, after Caltex has ended their contract. Air operators gave a warm welcome to the company and said the supply situation had immediately improved and fuel was now readily available at a moment’s notice.

ZAIN’S ONE NETWORK EXPANDS TO ZAMBIA
What used to be Celtel Africa’s continental network, allowing calls to 16 African countries at local call charges and free of charge roaming, has now been extended by renamed Zain to include Zambia and also Zain’s Middle Eastern home markets of Saudi Arabia and Bahrain as well as Jordan and Iraq. It is expected to eventually cover most of Africa, in particular new markets, where Zain is said to be interested in either new licenses or acquisitions.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

UGANDAN PRESIDENT COMMISSIONS NEW AIRFIELD

UGANDAN PRESIDENT COMMISSIONS NEW AIRFIELD
During his current nationwide poverty alleviation tour, President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni last weekend formally opened a new, privately owned airfield just outside the Southern or ‘Ishasha’ sector of Queen Elizabeth National Park at Kihihi. While visiting the Kanungu district, part of which also includes the access gateway of Buhoma to the Bwindi gorilla national park, he took the time from his busy schedule to see Mr. Garuga Musinguzi’s resort hotel just outside Queen Elizabeth National Park. The new all weather airstrip will ease aerial access to the park as the UWA owned park airfield at Ishasha is not long enough to cater for larger twin-engined large aircraft, a situation now resolved by the new field, just a few kilometers from the park gates. At the same time the field will also offer relief to the rather trickier landing strip at the Kayonza tea factory, which was in the past used to fly tourists to Bwindi. Mr. Musinguzi, for long the main financier of the opposition Forum for Democratic Change (FDC), was also welcomed back by the president into the National Resistance Movement (NRM) fold, when President Museveni announced his return to the ruling party.

ENVIRONMENTALISTS TARGET NEMA
The national environmental management authority has come under sustained criticism by the environmental and conservation lobby over their approval of Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA)’s without carrying out proper research. The accusation was made during a Nature Uganda public talk at the Uganda Museum late last week, when in particular the destruction of Cycad forests just outside Queen Elizabeth National Park was highlighted. Almost all of the ancient forest is just outside the park area and was due for cutting down to make way for a hydro-electric power plant, which location was highly criticized earlier in the year by conservationists. It was said then as it was reiterated now, that the developer had not done sufficient research into alternative locations for their power plant at the lower end of the Mpanga River, which could and should be built with lesser impact on the Cycad forest. The National Environment Management Authority (NEMA), in turn was blamed for rubberstamping the EIA submitted to them with equally insufficient research into the submissions. Watch this space.

KAMPALA ‘HILTON’ SITE DORMANT AGAIN
As has been observed for a while now, all construction activities related to the controversial construction of a new hotel on top of Nakasero Hill in central Kampala has stopped again, in spite of regular full-mouthed statements by the owners, who seem richer with words than with cash. According to sources from the site, no new materials have arrived to advance construction for a while now, leaving the clouds of doubt hanging over the ill-fated project.

In a related development, Kingdom Hotels has also so far shown no signs of commencing construction after fencing off their site some months ago. The prime 17 acre site was given to them by government to construct a hotel for the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting last year but after displacing a leading city primary school with nearly 1,000 pupils and the adjoining teachers training college and then dismantling the buildings, nothing at all happened causing angry outcries from the public over the hotel company’s failure to do anything with their “gift” so far.

RHINO FUND UGANDA NEWS
The executive director of the Rhino Fund Uganda (RFU), Mrs. Heidi Cragg, has given notice that she intends to return to South Africa for family reasons by the end of September. Heidi put the sanctuary at Ziwa back on level keel after the clouded departure of her predecessor, who had only served a few months before becoming involved in an altercation with a staff member and then leaving literally overnight, deserting the sanctuary and work in progress. Heidi has during her nearly two years at Ziwa made substantial progress in relations with donors, development partners and the tourism industry and visitor numbers to the Rhino Sanctuary are now at an all time high. RFU Chairman Dirk ten Brink confirmed to this correspondent that a new Executive Director will be appointed shortly after an intensive search for a successor. Visit www.rhinofund.org for more information on the activities of RFU and how to support it, and watch this space for the new appointment to be announced in due course.

CRASH REPORT OUT
The light aircraft crash earlier in the year in which all passengers, including two government ministers, and the pilot were killed while en-route to Western Kenya, was blamed by the air accident investigators on the lack of experience by the pilot and subsequent mistakes by him which led to the crash. The Cessna 210 aircraft was reportedly in good condition and all equipment functioning as prescribed. The pilot was reportedly not well acquainted with the terrain en route and the plane crashed due to judgment errors during VFR operation.

KENYA AIRWAYS TO DOUBLE RWANDA FLIGHTS
Reports have been received that Kenya Airways (KQ) has formally applied for a second daily flight between Nairobi and Kigali to add much needed extra capacity to the route. The airline presently flies only once a day between the two capital cities. It is expected that KQ will use their new Embraer 170 aircraft to operate the flights but this has not yet been confirmed. Once the flights commence operations Kenya Airways will become the number two airline after Rwandair in terms of flights in and out of Kigali. It was also learned that KQ was considering the launch of flights to Congo Brazzaville after a new bilateral air services agreement was signed between the two governments earlier in the week.

Rwandair in the meantime is seeking to employ a Chief Operating Officer in an ongoing effort to restructure the airline and expand its capacity and operations. In another twist of events it was also learned that Air Uganda’s Commercial Director will be leaving the airline after serving for less than a year as the upstart was dogged with challenges since its inception. Watch this space.

MICROSOFT CO-FOUNDER VISITS KENYA
Paul Allen, who founded Microsoft together with the better-known Bill Gates, has been paying a visit to the Kenyan coast with his private luxury yacht during the week. While the cruise liner was anchored off the ‘old Mombasa’ waterfront it attracted large crowds on shore trying to get a glimpse of the ship and its owner. Paul Allen and his entourage meanwhile visited the sight and reportedly took regular trips with the ship-based helicopter to the nearby national parks. The visit was undoubtedly a boost for Kenya’s efforts to revive its tourism industry as it gives a clear signal to would be visitors that the country is safe and sound once more.

WAIVE VISA FEES FOR CHILDREN SAYS KENYA TOURISM MINISTER
In a further effort to make Kenya more attractive as a tourism destination, Kenyan Tourism Minister Najib Balala recently called for a waiver of Visa fees for children accompanying their parents on a holiday to Kenya. The cost of visa, often criticized in this column as making visits to the region too expensive, can run easily into the US$200 region, when visiting just one country as a family of four, while visiting the entire region can set a family of four back by a multiple of that amount. Kenya has already made re-entries easier for tourists, who also visit a neighboring country within the East African Community (EAC), by granting free re-entry, but overall the problem requires a joint solution within the EAC to more fully exploit the tourism potential of the East African countries.

AIR TANZANIA STRUCK BY MISFORTUNE
Air Tanzania, Tanzania’s national airline, presently undergoing a fleet renewal program and on the way to revive its fortunes, has been struck by some misfortune during the week. The airline’s Boeing 737 suffered from engine damage when taking off from the lakeside airport of Mwanza, reportedly after sucking in an object from the runway while trying to take off. The resulting engine change has to be carried out by the lessor of the plane but the aircraft remains grounded until the new engine has arrived and been installed and the plane then re-certified for flight operations. At the same time both of the airline’s new Bombardier Q 300s were also grounded, when one of the two aircraft encountered nozzle problems while the other had a cockpit windowpane crack. Both of the aircraft are awaiting the spares, which should get them back in the air later in the week. Meanwhile, operations with ATC’s Airbus A320 continue uninterrupted although the domestic schedule has been thrown into some disarray as a result of the three aircraft being temporarily unserviceable. Air Tanzania is expected to resume their full schedule later in the week.

INCIDENT REPORTED FROM KIGALI AIRPORT
Dozens of passengers were reported stranded in Kigali yesterday following a yet unspecified incident with a Kenya Airways plane on landing. There are unconfirmed reports that the plane collided with an electricity pole and that subsequently the plane did not proceed with its journey to Nairobi to allow engineers evaluate any damage to the aircraft. The plane was reportedly coming from Bujumbura and was to pick up passengers in Kigali en-route to Kenya. No injuries were reported to any passengers or crew on the plane by the time of going to press and no damage report was available either.

BURUNDI TO REVIVE TOURISM
Having seen the success story of Rwanda’s tourism revival over the past decade, Burundi has now set its sights on making tourism a major part of the national economy in coming years. President Pierre Nkurunziza last week launched a coordinated campaign towards this end in Bujumbura’s Hotel ‘Club du Lac Tanganyika’. The President spoke of the positive impact tourism can have on environmental protection and in particular praised the values of ecotourism. Although geographically a small and densely populated country, Burundi nevertheless has three national parks as well as some nature reserves and monuments and most notably a Ramsar site where the Rusizi River enters Lake Tanganyika.

EMIRATES DISAPPOINTS A380 FANS
A regular reader of this column sent an email last weekend from New York City expressing disappointment over the absence of the scheduled A380 from Dubai to New York. Having booked this particular flight to experience the comfort of the giant Airbus for the first time, the traveler was taken aback when the aircraft was substituted against a Boeing 777. Said the traveler in the mail, “At least they did not cancel the flight and I got to New York, but I was so excited with the prospect to fly on the A380 and then bitterly disappointed.”

It was subsequently learned that the aircraft at the time was used for training purposes but it was later discovered that additional maintenance work was required, causing further A380 flights to New York being operated with other equipment over the coming days.

ZAMBIA TO ELECT NEW PRESIDENT
October 30th has been chosen to hold presidential elections in Zambia. The unscheduled exercise became necessary following the passing of President Mwanawasa some weeks ago. The late President will be remembered for his support to the Africa Travel Association by the tourism fraternity around the world, but also for his fight against corruption and for standing up to his neighboring dictator Mugabe, whose ‘re-election’ he did not recognize. Assurances have been given that the elections will not have any impact on tourist visits to Zambia, where in the past elections have been held in a generally peaceful environment.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

ENVIRONMENTAL LOBBY CONTINUES TO OPPOSE QUARRY

ENVIRONMENTAL LOBBY CONTINUES TO OPPOSE QUARRY
A stakeholder consultative meeting and workshop was organized last week by the National Association of Professional Environmentalists (NAPE) in Kampala, to discuss the plans by French-owned HIMA Cement to quarry for limestone in an area inside the Queen Elizabeth National Park. The Lafarge subsidiary had submitted an environmental impact assessment study but the approval by the National Environment Management Authority (NEMA) was rubbished by NAPE members as premature, poorly researched and ill considered.

It is expected that NAPE will take their opposition into the international arena now to make parent corporation Lafarge in France look bad, a method that has often work in the past in other parts of the world. It was also learned that both HIMA and the Uganda Wildlife Authority declined to make presentations at the meeting as the matter was in court under a case brought by NAPE and their supporters and therefore considered ‘sub judice.’

In a hard-hitting opinion piece in Uganda’s leading newspaper, the New Vision last week also published an attack against NEMA’s performance by a Member of Parliament, which can be accessed at http://www.newvision.co.ug/D/8/459/646754.

KANUNGU RESIDENTS SUFFER FROM MORE ELEPHANT INTRUSIONS
This column referred to the contentious matter a few weeks ago, and indeed the free roaming elephant were at the time chased back into Queen Elizabeth National Park’s ‘Ishasha Sector’ through the efforts of rangers from the Uganda Wildlife Authority. However, some of the elephant have now returned through swamps and wetlands which were not secured with trenches – in any case nearly impossible to do there – and have reportedly killed some residents of nearby villages who were trying to defend their property and families. Crops are also said to have been destroyed by the marauding animals and UWA rangers and wardens are again expected to be deployed to drive the animals back into the park proper and afford the population more protection.

The conflict between animals and populations has become more intense in recent years as the previously uninhabited ‘buffer zone’ between park and the nearest villages has shrunk considerably and homesteads are now literally coming up to the formal park boundaries. Some parks in Eastern Africa with similar problems, i.e. the Aberdare National Park in the Kenyan highlands, were over the past years enclosed with electric fences, but that is an expensive solution which not all wildlife management bodies can actually afford, while it also cuts off the age old migration routes of the wild animals and in the long run affects the gene pool of game populations ‘stuck’ behind barbed wire.

EMIRATES DELAYS DAILY A380 SERVICE TO JFK
The Kampala office of Emirates has now released information that their plans to offer a daily A380 service from Dubai to New York has been delayed for a few weeks due to the late delivery of their second A380 aircraft by manufacturer Airbus Industries. This will disappoint Ugandan travelers opting for Emirates to connect to New York, as it will not allow them for some time to have a daily service with the world’s largest passenger aircraft. Emirates presently fly daily from Entebbe to Dubai and use the A380 three times a week to New York. The other daily New York services are operated on other equipment.

KENYA AIRWAYS TO HOLD AGM
The annual general meeting of shareholders of Kenya Airways, East Africa’s aviation leader, will take place at the Moi International Sports Centre in Nairobi / Kasarani on the 26th of September, starting at 11 a.m. On the published agenda is the business of approving the annual accounts, deciding on the final dividend for the financial year and electing / re-electing Directors for the Board of the company.

On an even more positive note, Kenya Airways has once again swooped the board of awards annually presented by TN, and received last week the honours as: Best Domestic Airline, Best Regional Airline, Best African Airline, Best Inflight Magazine and Best Frequent Flyer Programme. TN, the regional premier travel and lifestyle magazine, carries out an annual survey amongst readers ‘Quest for the Best’, to establish the most favourite hotels, lodges, resorts, restaurants and of course airlines, all selected by popular vote.

AIR ARABIA SET FOR NAIROBI
The Sharjah / United Arab Emirates based first Gulf region low cost airline is now set for flights between Nairobi and Sharjah from the end of October. Air Arabia has been a success story since its inception proving initial critics wrong that low cost airline operations would have no place in the ‘rich’ Gulf region. Air Arabia, using an A320 aircraft, will initially fly four times a week but has left open the option to increase the number of flights once demand and loadfactors justifies a capacity increase. Nairobi will be the airline’s fourth African destination. The intended market is thought to be the rapidly increasing East African expatriate workers population in the Gulf area but sales efforts will also target clients for affordable package holidays from the Gulf to Eastern Africa, which will no doubt benefit the tourism industry here. No fares were available at the time of going to press.

This latest addition to the range of scheduled flights into Nairobi spells good news for the recovery of the country’s tourism sector, which has been making giant strides since the record lows of earlier in the year.

No choice partner in East Africa has been announced yet by Air Arabia, to link their Nairobi flights to the wider region, but Fly540 – East Africa’s own low cost carrier, is thought to stand the best chance to get the nod and fly passengers from Entebbe and other regional airports to connect to the Air Arabia flights.

QATAR AIRWAYS TO OFFER EXTRA OPTIONS FOR US FLIGHTS
The Qatar Airways office in Nairobi has announced that they will commence flights from Doha on a daily basis to New York’s JFK airport. Qatar Airways presently flies daily to Nairobi and passengers from the region can connect to the Doha bound flights with an airline of their choice, mostly Kenya Airways. The airline already flies from Doha to Atlanta and will shortly also add flights to Houston, widening the choices of travelers bound for the US.

Traditionally US bound travelers connected in the past through Europe with the main European airlines serving East Africa but transit visa requirements, in particular for the UK, complicated that journey to no end for many East African citizens. Over the past years a growing number of passengers therefore opted to connect via Johannesburg with South African Airways or via Addis Ababa with Ethiopian Airlines and of course via Dubai with Emirates, which has taken the East African market by storm in spite of the ‘detour’ through the UAE. In fact the stopover options in Dubai and elsewhere in the UAE are attractive for many travelers as it allows a last bit of shopping before returning home.

COMPLAINTS ABOUT THE STATE OF WILSON AIRPORT
The Kenya Association of Air Operators, individual airlines and aircraft owners have recently voiced their concern over the state of the facilities at Nairobi’s Wilson Airport. The aerodrome is the base for the largest number of aircraft in Eastern Africa and used for charters and scheduled domestic flights to most of the national parks. The air operators have taken their case to the public complaints commission over the KAA’s failure to modernize and expand passenger facilities and decongest the airport, which during peak times, i.e. most of the day, is now suffering from overcrowded apron spaces, parking and taxiways.

The operators and users of Wilson demand a swift modernization of the facility while sources close to the KAA pointed at the ongoing work at the main Jomo Kenyatta International Airport and work plans for the Kisumu airport, which may have delayed the start of planning for Wilson. Yet, Wilson Airport is used by literally all safari clients flying into the parks and congestion and antiquated facilities will throw eventually a poor light on the airport administrators and managers. Air operators blamed frequent changes to the ‘old’ modernization plans but also regular policy changes and u-turns on the lamentable situation.

MOMBASA ‘CONTINENTAL RESORT’ REOPENS
In another milestone towards putting the political troubles firmly behind, the former ‘Intercontinental Hotel’ on Mombasa’s Shanzu Beach / North Coast has reopened its doors last week. The hotel, which initially opened in 1983, went into decline already when it was still under Intercontinental management, lingered along and eventually was put into receivership in 2001 and later closed. A group of new investors eventually put up the funds to rehabilitate and refurbish the nearly 180 rooms, but when the work was complete in late 2007 the political crisis struck Kenya’s tourism industry, putting on halt plans to fully reopen. This however was now rectified at last and the Kenyan coast can offer another state of the art 5 star property for beach vacations.

THAI CRISIS STIMULATES DEMAND FOR KENYA BEACH HOLIDAYS
As an apparent fall out from the political crisis in Thailand’s capital Bangkok, where the standoff between opposition and government supporters continues, demand for holidays in Kenya immediately rose, as tour operators monitor the situation carefully and a number of holiday makers already opted for alternative beach destinations thought safer.

Many countries have over the past few days issued harsh anti travel advisories for their citizens and warned them in no uncertain terms to avoid travelling to Bangkok. Just as Thailand, and other beach holiday destinations at the time, benefited earlier in the year from the Kenyan political crisis which saw tourism slump to a long time low, the role has now been reversed and Kenya is ready to absorb extra numbers of sun seekers until Thai politics settle down again and it travel advisories are tuned down or lifted.

ORTPN SET TO DEVELOP DISTRICT TOURISM PLANS
In a further effort to decentralize tourism and widen the scope of attractions across the country, the Rwanda Office for Tourism and National Parks has now started the process of developing district tourism plans, which are aimed to identify tourism opportunities and define ways and means to exploit the local attractions and tie them into a national tourism circuit under full participation of local communities.

In a related development it was also announced that ORPTN plans to fence sections of the Akagera National Park to control unauthorized entry and stop poachers, encroachers and cattle herders from entering the park at will, but also to protect neighboring communities from dangerous animals straying out of the park and endangering people or destroying their crops. Dubai World, which is becoming the biggest investor in the country’s hospitality and tourism sector with a 250 million plus US Dollars investment, has apparently offered to pay for the 15 million US Dollar project.

DISARMING CONGO MILITIAS NOT ON COURSE
The special representative of the UN, the special representative of the EU for the Great Lakes Region and the head of MONUC had to admit last week at a press conference in Kigali, that their efforts to disarm the genocide militias camped inside the DR Congo and roaming at will, had not been successful so far. The mostly ethnic Hutu killer gangs often perpetrate hit and run attacks across the borders but in particular MONUC had busied itself with persecuting and pursuing Tutsi self protection groups while the notorious genocide militias have long gone unchecked and even engaged in what appear to be joint operations with the DRC troops deployed in Eastern Congo. The hastily arranged press meeting was also told that a meeting would take place in Kinshasa with the aim to implement the Nairobi accord which demands the disarming and dissolution of the ‘FDLR’ and their return to Rwanda for a due judicial process over the role they played in 1994 and afterwards.

AID FLIGHT CRASHES NEAR BUKAVU
A chartered Beech 1900 with 15 passengers and 2 crew crashed in heavy rain and clouds near Bukavu earlier in the week. The aircraft was on an aid mission and the occupants had chartered the plane through Air Serve from abroad, due to Congo’s dismal aviation record amongst their own airlines. No detail about the aid organization was immediately available but there was speculation that it could have been a UN linked organization. The plane reportedly came from Kisangani and was enroute to Bukavu, but no further details could be availed from sources in Eastern Congo by the time of going to press. All on board are said to have perished in the crash, when the aircraft flew into the side of a mountain and early search efforts revealed no signs of survivors.

CHINA’S HUNGER FOR IVORY BLAMED ON POACHING
The recent increase in poaching witnessed in Eastern Africa was swiftly blamed by conservationists on the recent relaxing of the total ban in trade with ivory, which was partly lifted on insistence of the Southern African countries. As seen previously in a repeat pattern, once ivory trade from one part of Africa is lifted to sell ‘old stocks’ poaching in Eastern Africa immediately increases with much of the bloody loot then smuggled out, allegedly often to the very Southern African states which ‘legally’ trade in ivory to be ‘integrated’ into those stocks or to boost them again for another round of arguments at the CITES meetings to sell ‘old stocks’. Allegations were made over the sale in particular against countries suspected to turn a blind eye on the smuggled ivory, creating deep divisions amongst conservationists between the two camps.

Much of the ivory so traded ends up in China, Japan and other parts of the South and Far East, where the lust for ivory carvings seems to go on unabated. Recent reports from Kenya also lament the increase in poaching there, inspite of a well trained and equipped anti poaching force operated by Kenya Wildlife Services. There are also allegations that implicate China in more than three quarters of all smuggled ivory. 


KING OF BUSOGA PASSES
The ‘Kyabazinga’ (local vernacular description of ‘King’) of Busoga, one of Uganda’s traditional major kingdoms, has earlier in the week died at Uganda’s main hospital Mulago in Kampala. The kingdom, which geographically adjoins the river Nile and Lake Victoria and extends from Jinja to Lake Kyoga and towards Eastern Uganda, is one of several restored by the NRM government in 1994 as a cultural entity. The King, Henry Wako Muloki, was 87 years old and generally considered a unifying figure, respected not only in Busoga but across the entire nation and he portrayed the restored kingship as a fatherly leader. A state of national mourning has been declared by President Museveni until the expected state funeral.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

UGANDA SET FOR UN SECURITY COUNCIL

UGANDA SET FOR UN SECURITY COUNCIL
After receiving an approving nod from the African Union, Uganda seems set to be voted on the UN Security Council for the next term of non permanent members, representing the African continent. Rival Madagascar has apparently stepped aside in favor Uganda. This is perceived to be not just an honor for the country but also an affirmation of the democratic progress made since dispatching the former dictators in the mid ‘80s. Uganda is also reportedly set to assume the African Union chair at the next major AU summit, which would add further profile to the country and should attract more investment, more trade and more visitors in coming years, all of which will benefit the nation. Uganda has in the recent past participated in global UN missions with peacekeeping troops, most notably in Somalia but also in West Africa. Reports from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs also indicate that Uganda would use her position to lobby for a radical change at the UN Security Council’s set up which could see two African nations hold permanent seats, should the demand for change be accepted by the global body’s assembly.

VOLCANOES ADDING NEW LODGE AT KYAMBURA
The Kyambura Game Reserve, which adjoins the Queen Elizabeth National Park, has long been one of the easiest places to track for chimpanzees in the area, but tourists staying at the other lodges in the park had to commute some distance for this activity. The reserve is also home to several crater lakes and borders Lake George and the Kazinga Channel, offering a unique safari experience. Volcanoes Safaris is now in the process of adding an 8-room eco-lodge on their 60 acres site adjoining the upper Kyambura gorge, allowing more or less instant access for their guests to the starting point of the tracking. The new lodge, which like all other Volcanoes properties is expected to blend well into the surrounding landscape, is expected to open its doors to the public early next year.

Volcanoes has also partnered with the neighboring community to intensify protection of the wildlife. Towards this end they acquired a former clay extraction site used for making building bricks, which will be converted into a wetland, aimed to attract birds and wildlife to the location. Queen Elizabeth national park is already known as home to over 600 species of resident and migratory birds, making it arguably one of the richest bird watching destinations on the globe.

AERO CLUB ADDS PC12
The Kampala Aero Club and Flight Training Centre, based at the Kajjansi airfield a short distance outside Kampala on the main Entebbe road, has just added another plane to their growing fleet of light single and twin-engined aircraft. Their new PC12 will commence operations imminently now catering for growing demand of tourist charters and flying oil company personnel to and from the exploration sites in the Albertine Graben. Senior management of KAFTC has also indicated that yet another Cessna 208 Grand Caravan may be on the way to Kajjansi, should traffic growth continue as experienced in recent months. Visit www.flyuganda.com for more information.

UNWTO MEMBERSHIP REMAINS SUSPENDED
Uganda’s ongoing failure to pay arrears accumulated as well as the current subscription to the United Nations World Tourism Organization had left the country’s membership in suspension. For much of the past decade the Ministry of Tourism failed to raise the funds needed to maintain membership and benefit from UNWTO programs aimed towards developing countries and, in particular, the group of Least Developed Countries (LDCs) for which marketing support and human resource development funds worth a multiple of their actual dues are readily available. During a hearing in parliament over the Ministry’s budget it was also learned that membership dues for other continental and international bodies remain in arrears due to lack of funds. The Ministry of Tourism, Trade and Industry has long been one of the least facilitated government ministries in spite of tourism’s generated income topping the list of economic sectors. Ministry officials preferring to remain unnamed blamed the situation on a lack of understanding about how tourism functions amongst the Ministry of Finance budget planners and senior staff.

HOTELS FINALLY SIGN UNION AGREEMENTS
In the run up to the Commonwealth Summit last year hotels were told that they needed to permit their staff to join a trade union of their choice, something many hotel owners had fought up to this point with determination. At the time only the Sheraton Kampala Hotel had signed a collective bargaining agreement with the union representing hotel workers. However, the summit preparations changed all of that and finally, almost a year after the summit, the hotel owners association signed an agreement with the two key unions representing hotel staff. The signing ceremony took place earlier in the week. What however caused some consternation was the comment by an assistant commissioner for local government, calling on the hotels to promptly pay the hotel tax recently made operational.

EASTERN UGANDA PUT ON WEATHER ALERT
The meteorological department in Entebbe has given an early bird notice to authorities in the East of the country about expected heavy rains over the next two or three months, some of which may cause flooding similar to the situation experienced last year. However, the advance warning will now allow governmental agencies and bodies to prepare for the heavy rains, which took the country by surprise a year ago and led to the closure of roads and bridges while displacing many people and ruining their planted crops. Meanwhile nights were unusually cool recently with temperatures falling as low as 14 degrees centigrade, caused by a combination of overcast skies and unfavourable winds. Kampala was also once again pounded by strong rainstorms, causing flooding in some city and suburban areas after the heavy down pours.

CONDOR MADE EMERGENCY STOP IN MOMBASA
German holiday airline Condor, en-route from Mauritius to Frankfurt / Germany with over 270 passengers and crew on board, had to make an emergency landing at Kenya’s Mombasa Moi International Airport last Thursday around lunch time. Reports from Kenya’s coastal city say that problems apparently occurred inflight with one of the plane’s two engines, which developed vibrations and probably also leaked fuel. The crew, after shutting down the faulty engine, then decided to land the plane in Mombasa, where the emergency services including fire engines were subsequently put on alert and deployed. The Boeing 767 landed however without any incident and all passengers and crew were able to disembark normally. A relief plane was due in Mombasa the next day (Friday) to fly passengers and crew home to Germany after they spent an extra unscheduled day at the Indian Ocean beaches of Mombasa.
Happening only a day after the Madrid Spanair crash the precautions taken by the crew and their prompt reaction and decision to rather land the plane in Kenya to establish the cause of the problem was generally applauded by the affected passengers, according to a report from Mombasa.

TANZANIA MOURNS PASSING OF TOURISM MARKETEER
The Arusha International Conference Centre Director of Marketing and Conferences, Mr. James Mgani, has passed away last week following a short illness. Mr. Mgani had met members of the Africa Travel Association during their global summit earlier in the year and will also be remembered by the Leon Sullivan Summit participants, besides the many more visitors from around the world who had attended meetings and conferences in Arusha in recent years. James worked in the tourism industry in various capacities for the past two decades and was a dedicated promoter for the country and its tourism sector. He had joined the Arusha International Conference Centre in 1990 and is mourned by his family and the many friends he made inside and outside Tanzania during his career.

RWANDAIR TO ADD CARGO SERVICES
The Executive Chairman of Rwandair earlier in the week confirmed that Rwanda’s national airline is due to establish a separate cargo operation in a few months time. The strategic objective of this move will be to guarantee affordable, regular and dedicated airfreight capacity to export flowers, fruits and vegetables to the consumer markets in Europe and the Middle East, as the present capacity for palletized cargo is limited to the flights of Brussels Airlines, and for loose cargo to Kenya Airways and Ethiopian. It was also confirmed that negotiations with Lonrho Africa’s airline partner Fly540 are on course and expected to be concluded soon. This will result in the Rwandan government selling 49 percent of its stake to Fly540 while a portion of the remaining shares will then go to some institutional investors from Rwanda itself, to retain the required number of shares for the nationality clauses in international and bilateral agreements with other countries.

The airline has also confirmed that they are putting together a team of consultants to develop a new strategic plan and a new business plan to be prepared for the challenges ahead in coming years.

RWANDA WELCOMES ELECTION MONITORS
President Paul Kagame formally welcomed the leaders of the EU election monitoring team, who arrived in the country early in the week. Unlike in other African countries the Rwandan government had invited monitoring teams for the forthcoming parliamentary general elections. The visitors will undoubtedly boost hotel occupancies substantially across the country but are also expected to take in the sights of Rwanda, and maybe even track for the mountain gorillas, while in country. The main elections campaign was launched by the President at the main Kigali stadium before thousands of excited RPF supporters.

JUBA TRAVELERS LEFT STRANDED AND DISORGANIZED
Complaints have emerged from Juba, Southern Sudan’s capital city, that of late the Air Uganda service was erratic which led to regular delays, at one stage to the point that permission for take off had to be denied by Air Traffic Control as darkness settled over the airport. In the absence of functioning lighting systems the airport is only conducting daylight operations, a fact well known to most airlines, and the Air Uganda aircraft had to stay in Juba overnight before returning the next morning to Entebbe. At least some clients were reportedly lucky that afternoon to ‘hitch a ride’ on one of the Nairobi based airlines’ planes, which routed via Entebbe dropping them off, while the rest of the booked passengers had to make their own arrangements for the extra night in Juba. Upon some further investigation it was then learned that one of the airline’s two MD aircraft was away for at least a month on an ACMI lease arrangement in West Africa, leaving the remaining aircraft struggling to perform all the required scheduled flights, leave along doing them on time. During subsequent days a number of other travellers also apparently flew via Nairobi to reach their final destination.

EAST AFRICA EXCELS IN BEIJING
The recently ended 29th Olympic Games of modern times in China again brought success to the East African nations, with Kenya in their best Olympic showing ever bagging 5 Gold, 5 Silver and 4 Bronze medals, putting them firmly on top of the African rankings. Ethiopia came a close second with 4 Gold, 1 Silver and 2 Bronze medals, while Zimbabwe came a respectable third in the African standings, a major miracle considering the economic and political turmoil back home. Cameroon and Tunisia also got one Gold each, while some of the African political and economic powerhouses like Egypt, Nigeria or South Africa ended up way down the scale having to settle for some of the runner up spots or third places or even no medal honors at all. Well done in particular to the Kenyan and Ethiopian athletes for doing Africa proud and putting East Africa on top of the world news with good news. Well done indeed!

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

AFRICA MOURNS ZAMBIAN PRESIDENT

AFRICA MOURNS ZAMBIAN PRESIDENT
African and world leaders expressed their condolences upon the passing of President Levy Mwanawasa of Zambia, who died earlier in the week in Paris. He had suffered a stroke during the African Union summit in Sharm el Sheikh some weeks ago and was airlifted from Egypt to Paris for treatment. The late President Mwanawasa was hailed by amongst others President Bush for his relentless fight against corruption but more recently also about his outspoken criticism of Mr. Mugabe for stealing the elections in Zimbabwe and for the violence unleashed against the Zimbabwean people by his goon squads.

Zambia has in recent years firmly established a reputation as a leading African adventure and wildlife tourism destination with the Victoria Falls of the Zambezi River arguably the best known attraction. National mourning is now underway in Zambia for a week but tourist visitors are able to conduct their safaris without any hindrance or problems, it has been pointed out to this correspondent by contacts in Lusaka.

UGANDA TO HOST AU SUMMIT
A special summit of the African Union was called for March 2009 and Kampala has been selected as the venue for the continental meeting. It is understood that the African heads of state and government will deal with the growing crisis in Africa over displaced people and raging conflicts, which has brought misery to millions of innocent young, adult and aged persons. UNHCR reports attribute over 1.5 million refugees and well over 4 million internally displaced people to Eastern Africa alone. The Entebbe – Kampala sector hotels and conference venues expect to be fully booked during the still to be confirmed final dates of the summit and would be visitors to Uganda in March next year do well to get early confirmations from their selected hotels and book their flights with airlines of their choice, as there too the fully booked signs are expected to go up soon.

This latest major conference coming to Kampala is thought to be a direct result of the job well done in preparing and hosting CHOGM last year, proving eternal critics of the major investments undertaken by government and the private sector in infrastructure and hospitality businesses once again wrong.

SHERATON TO INVEST A FURTHER US$10M
Information received last week indicates that the hotel has in the run up of Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) already spent US$27 million in rehabilitations, remodeling and refurbishments. It was now confirmed by the General Manager Jawaid Akhtar that a further US$10 million will be spent in the coming year to ensure the hotel retains its top level ranking in the country. The UAE based owning company Midroc, which also owns the Sheraton hotels in Addis Ababa and Djibouti as well as resorts and hotels elsewhere, has apparently approved the expenditure and availed the funds. Part of the work expected to be done will be a remodeling of the ‘Lion Centre’ set in the gardens of the hotel as a conference and function venue cum restaurant.

CONFLICTING REPORTS ON CONSERVATION SUPPORT FOR OIL VENTURES
During the last week some contradictory reports emerged in the local media over the level of opposition or support to oil exploration and the construction of a mini refinery and thermal power plant in the Kaiso-Tonya wildlife reserve, which adjoins the Murchisons Falls National Park. What is clear is that public consultations were held and many submissions were made during the consultations in Hoima and also directly to NEMA about the plans. It is also clear that a full environmental impact assessment will soon go underway. Some conservation bodies asked to widen the EIA scope to include the entire Albertine Rift area to create a better understanding for the impact of the ongoing drilling, exploration and eventual production and processing of crude oil. Adds this correspondent: ‘as long as global best practise is employed by the oil companies, and sustainably ensured and transparently monitored, Uganda has no choice but to exploit these resources in the interest of developing the nation. Oil companies involved in drilling, exploration, production and processing must however make lasting contributions towards the conservation of wildlife and towards the protection ob biodiversity in the Albertine Rift to allow not only for the use of the new oil resource but also the long term protection of wildlife and nature based tourism. Business, conservation and tourism need to learn to coexist and show mutual respect for each other in the national interest. That does include foregoing quick fix solutions and carefully balancing the pro’s and con’s in each and every case’.

UGANDA AND SOUTH SUDAN DISCUSS RAILWAY LINK
A meeting between the representatives of the two governments took place earlier in the week, discussing the joint infrastructure project. The existing railway heads at Gulu and Pakwach are to be linked by a new railway line initially to Juba, Southern Sudan’s capital, and then on to Wau, a town further North but still within the Southern Sudan’s territory. The project has been on the drawing board for some time now and will, once complete, offer a strategically important rail link for the South Sudan to the Indian Ocean ports of Mombasa and Dar es Salaam, allowing for imports and exports through friendly countries and avoiding transiting the rather more hostile Arabic North of the Sudan. A referendum on the future of the Southern Sudan, presently an autonomous region with its own government structure under the CPA – Comprehensive Peace Agreement – of 2005, will be held in 2011, deciding if the South will become independent or remain, possibly with an even stronger status, within a united Sudan.

GREED AND ENVY ISSUES TAKEN TO COURT
Sad news have reached that, as repeatedly reported in this column in past months over the pending dispute about gorilla tracking permits linked to the Nkuringo Community Development Trust Fund, Uganda Wildlife Authority has now been taken to court. The aim of the suit is to overturn a contract signed with the NCDTF, which is supported by USAID and the African Wildlife Foundation. The Uganda Wildlife Authority has so far stood firm in the face of thinly concealed intimidation, political lobbying and a foul mouthing campaign against the promoters of the deal by those opposed to the signed contracts for their own motives. It speaks volumes about the mindset of the plaintiffs that they waited for the new ‘Clouds’ eco lodge to near completion and open its doors, after an investment of over US$1.2 million was sank into the project, before they went to court. Such actions, according to a leading investor in the safari lodge sector also at times in the crosshairs of the same agitators, may make it more difficult in the future to attract funds for investments in new lodges and resorts, if anyone could then go to court and attempt to carve out a ‘piece of the cake’.

The Uganda Wildlife Authority has according to usually well-informed sources already filed their defense in the High Court and stands firmly by the contract. Once the case reaches the hearing stages this column will report further developments.

NAKURU SET FOR NEW AERODROME
Information was received from Kenya that the construction of a terminal / office building and a bituminized landing strip will go underway soon just outside Nakuru. The construction should be completed within the next two years. Although there is a small airstrip inside Nakuru national park the new facility should allow for larger light and turboprop aircraft to land near the park and cater for more tourist visitors to arrive by air from other parts of the country. Air safaris across the Eastern African national parks and game reserves have gained in popularity in recent years as it substantially cuts the time tourists spend on the road and hugely increases the time visitors can actually spend in the game parks watching wildlife.

KISUMU AIRPORT EXPANSION THREATENED BY CLAIMS
As was reported previously in this column, the expansion of Kisumu airport has taken a serious knock on the time table following sections of the surrounding community continuing to demand some financial compensation from the Kenya Airports Authority. The land in question was allotted in the twilight days of colonialism to build the airport and the handful of people living there or nearby were resettled at the time. However, the enormous demands now vented by the descendents and few originally affected people have spiraled beyond the billion Kenya Shilling mark, supported and egged on by ‘community and clan leaders.’ While KAA seems willing to make some payments the sheer magnitude of the demands may still put the proverbial spanner in the works and this important infrastructural project is now hanging by a thread. Watch this space.

KENYA SAFARI DRIVER AND GUIDE ASSOCIATION BLASTS ITALIAN CONTRACTOR
The association of the safari drivers and guides has protested sharply over delays in completing one of the major roads into the Masai Mara Game Reserve by an Italian contractor, mirroring the Ugandan experience with an Italian firm over the completion of the Northern bypass. Drivers and tourists suffer from often impassable or very difficult to drive on roads in and out of the reserve, where the annual migration of the wildebeest from the Serengeti into the Masai Mara can be seen every year around this time. Major roads and tracks inside the reserve too are said to be in a bad state and after heavy rains often impassable, as seen early in the year. While those who can afford it now rather fly into the parks and reserves and use lodge or camp based transportation and their local guides, the road safari segment is nevertheless still the largest in the safari sector and needs decent roads connecting the key parks on the safari circuit.

AIR TANZANIA TO PARTNER WITH CHINESE AIRLINE
As indicated some time ago in this column, it has now finally been confirmed that Air Tanzania will indeed invite a Chinese airline to acquire 49 percent of their shares and inject much needed extra capital into the Tanzanian national airline. According to further information available, the China Development Bank will make loans available for the purchase of additional new planes in coming months, probably of both Airbus and Boeing make, to allow the airline resume traffic on international, continental and regional routes which it could not serve due to lack of suitable aircraft. The airline already operates a recently acquired A320 and two recently acquired Q300, with two Q400 turboprop aircraft due to join the fleet in 2009. While this development means good news for Air Tanzania and Tanzanians and the country in general other airlines in the region will have to take a hard look at their own business strategies, in particular smaller one or two plane and upstart airlines, to be ready when Air Tanzania will eventually unleash quality competition on them.

AIR ZARA JOINS THE THRONG
A family owned airline has now reportedly started operations from Dar es Salaam with a Boeing 737-200, not the best of credentials these days for an upstart company, as this type of aircraft – while cheap to lease or buy – burns substantially more fuel compared to more modern jets and is more expensive to maintain. The aircraft is reportedly fitted with 14 business class and 96 economy class seats, again considered large for the Nairobi route they intend to fly regularly on scheduled services. The aircraft will also be available for charters according to the promoters. The airline headquarters will be based at the international airport in Dar es Salaam. Best of luck to the newcomers, safe landings and time will tell just how well they will eventually do.

SMALL FERRY SINKS IN LAKE VICTORIA
An apparently privately owned Tanzanian ferry ship sank with about 250 tons of cargo but luckily no loss of live, as the ship went down near Bukasa Island. Ugandan fishermen and an emergency response team dispatched from the Entebbe pier, after the news of the accident reached the shores rescued all 15 crew and passengers on board of the vessel, which was en-route from Mwanza to Port Bell. Demands for a more comprehensive search and rescue capacity between the three countries bordering the lake however re-emerged promptly, as calls also grew louder to crack down on the overloading of vessels and lack of ship inspections which are to ensure safety equipment is on board, is working and the crew is trained to respond to emergencies of this kind. Demands for better regulation, oversight and enforcement of existing rules were also voiced in the Ugandan parliament after the story reached the legislators.

RWANDA SET FOR PARLIAMENTARY POLLS
Last week parliament in Kigali was dissolved by President Paul Kagame at the end of its elected term. A general election for parliament is now taking place on 15th of September this year. This will be another milestone in the process of growing deeper roots for democracy in Rwanda, which has risen like the proverbial phoenix from the ashes of the 1994 genocide under the leadership of the RPF. Presidential elections are however not due for some more years.

CHINESE TO INVEST IN RWANDA HOTEL SECTOR
The Rwanda Investment and Export Promotion Agency this week announced that a major Chinese firm had signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Kigali City Council to acquire and develop 2 hectares of prime land around the ‘Jali Club’ and Rwanda Television. The Chinese are said to be investing some 40 million US Dollars into the project. Rwanda – China relations have strengthened since the China – Africa Summit earlier in the year and investments by Chinese companies are on the rise, not just in Rwanda but the region and the continent at large.

BURUNDI HOTELIERS PROTEST TAX RISES
The recent budget in Burundi has seen the tax burden for hotels and restaurants increased to a whopping 22 percent, a measure the fledgling Burundi tourism sector says will cripple their efforts to promote the country as a destination due to the high cost on visitors. This constitutes an increase of 5 percent and does not include provision for service charge or any type of a levy for the promotion of tourism or support for hospitality training yet. After peace returned to the country following the agreement by the former government and rebel groups, Burundi is now emerging from the political and economic doldrums and has become an integral part of the East African Community.

SOUTH AFRICAN AIRWAYS WRESTLES HONORS FROM KQ
The South African national airline has resumed the continental top ranking according to the findings of Skytrax, when the latest annual best airline details were released last week. The position had in past years changed hands between KQ and SAA at regular intervals, spurring service improvement at both airlines to recapture the ‘lost’ position the following year. Ethiopian Airlines this year came second and KQ slipped to third most favorite airline in Africa but remains the firm favorite in the East African region.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

CLOUDS LODGE OPENING GETS MAGIC TOUCH

CLOUDS LODGE OPENING GETS MAGIC TOUCH
The latest addition to the stable of Wild Places Africa / Uganda commenced operations last weekend, when Clouds opened the doors for the public. The first weekend was graced by the presence of two magicians and their parties, when guests named Merlin and Prospero checked in to the delight of management and the reception staff. The guests, however, did not need to wave their magic wands to have their every need attended to, as all the staff were at their Sunday best, according to reports from another visitor, and treated their first guests to excellent meals and perfect service. The lodge is providing access to both the Nkuringo gorillas as well as to a nearby group of chimpanzees in a rare combination of tracking both primates from one place. Clouds joins the sister operations Semliki Safari Lodge, Apoka Safari Lodge and of course the 5 star boutique hotel Emin Pasha in Kampala’s fashionable Nakasero suburb.

The new up-market ecolodge is located high up in the hills, surrounded by rainforest on land provided by the Nkuringo community, who are the major stakeholder in the venture. The venture was supported by USAID’s ‘Prime West’ project in a deal put together between the African Wildlife Foundation, USAID, the Uganda Wildlife Authority and the Nkuringo Community Development Trust Fund in a ground breaking agreement aimed to empower communities living near protected areas in exchange for good will, conservation participation and a sustainable income plus employment opportunities. Visit the ‘Clouds’ website at www.wildplacesafrica.com or write to [email protected] for more information and bookings.

UGANDA TOURISM EXHIBITS IN JAPAN
Information has been received that Uganda will participate in the World Tourism Congress in Tokyo in September this year. The tourism trade show is organized by the Japan Association of Travel Agents and participants from Uganda will be trying hard to promote the country’s tourism attractions and bio-diversity. Enquiries or requests for meetings with the Tourist Board personnel or private sector participants can be made in advance through the Uganda Tourist Board office in Kampala via [email protected]

The country will later in the year also participate once again at the World Travel Market in London and inquiries can be made through the Uganda Tourist Board for meeting appointments or for details of expected participants.

UGANDAN PRESIDENT DECLINES PLEA FOR FOREST REDUCTION
During a recent visit to the East of the country as part of his nationwide poverty reduction policy President Yoweri Kaguta Museveni denied a request passed to him by the minister for Tourism, Trade and Industry to use 7,500 hectares of Mt. Elgon forest land for resettlement purposes. The president, however, demanded to know first what impact the forest reduction would have on the environment and how it would affect the ecological balance in this important water catchment area. The National Environment Management Authority was instructed to prepare a scientific study to that effect and no decision will now be taken by the minister until those studies have been produced and checked out. The President also directed that human resettlement could in the meantime be done in other more suitable areas. Mt. Elgon National Park was long a hot spot for the Uganda Wildlife Authority in trying to evict illegal settlers and the top level support will be most welcome news for conservationists.

Political groups in the area also joined the growing chorus of political, business and civic leaders across the entire country, for President Museveni to seek another term of office come election time in 2011, leaving opposition groups squabbling and trailing in the wake of the ruling National Resistance Movement party. President Museveni came to power in January 1986 when driving out the dictatorships of old as then head of the National Resistance Army and has since then won general elections in 1996, 2001 and 2006.

MORE CREDITORS CHASE ENTEBBE ROAD HOTEL DEBTS
While Barclays Bank Uganda now has to wait until the main case is heard and determined by court in a few months over a massive debt incurred by the owners of the infamous Entebbe road hotel, and was temporarily restrained from selling off the assets of the owners given as loan security, more woes just crept across the horizon. A kitchen and furniture supplier has now also gone to court over large sums of outstanding money, which were not paid after the botched (non)opening of the hotel prior to the Commonwealth Summit last year. The extensive office and shop arcades along the main road to Entebbe are also still glaringly empty and a number of buildings which can be seen from the main road are lingering in limbo, without roofs or any visible signs of building work.

OIL RESERVES INCREASE WITH NEW FINDS
Tullow Oil has just announced a new major producing well they drilled in one of the designated oil exploration areas along the Albertine rift. Conservative estimates put Uganda’s oil wealth to an assured 300 million barrels but present exploration activities could raise this figure multi-fold in coming months and years. A mini refinery is presently being planned to process around 4.000 barrels of crude oil a day, initially for the production of heavy fuel oil needed to power a thermal power plant in the area. The news were greeted with relief by the business community in Uganda which has been suffering of exorbitant fuel cost and high electricity prices, all of which in the medium term should be contained once oil production starts some time in 2009. Government too will be relieved at the prospect of seeing a sustainable income enter the budget equation from next year onwards, which can be used to fund health, education and infrastructure projects and developments, amongst many other urgent needs the country has. In a related development it was also announced during the week that the construction of the pipeline extension from Eldoret in Western Kenya to Kampala would commence in September. The 350 km pipeline extension will bring relief to Uganda and the hinterland nations as the new fuel pick up point will save an arduous journey by road and reduce heavy traffic considerably from the Kenyan border into Uganda. The pipeline, to be built by Libya’s Tamoil, is expected to cost about US$200 million .

Upon completion of the project attention will turn to the existing pipeline from Mombasa’s main oil depot at Kilindini Harbour to Eldoret, which is already running at full capacity and requires a substantial expansion in order to serve both Kenya and the African hinterland for years to come.

UWEC TURNS CHIMP BIRTHDAY INTO PROMOTIONAL EVENT
The birthday today of Zakayo, UWEC’s oldest chimpanzee with now 44 years on his back, has been turned into a major event to promote more visitors to the wildlife education center. Zakayo was kept at the Entebbe Zoo, which in the mid ‘90s turned into the Wildlife Education Centre with support from the World Bank’s PAMSU program and from the EU, besides generous assistance from the Ugandan corporate sector.

KENYA AIRWAYS WANTS MORE FLIGHTS ON ENTEBBE ROUTE
Following the recent withdrawal of Air Uganda’s morning flight to Nairobi, Kenya Airways (KQ) has now through the usual diplomatic channels requested to up their own frequencies from presently four a day to five a day, just as soon as the bureaucratic steps have been taken and a new schedule been approved. This will be good news to theKQ faithful, who can earn mileage credits on their frequent flyer program with every flight, either between Entebbe and Nairobi but more importantly beyond, when using KQ’s extensive network. Information was also received that KQ might for some of their flights permanently substitute the present B737NG aircraft with the larger B767 to allow for more passengers but also facilitate the shipping of palletized cargo between the two airports.

Kenya Airways in the meantime has taken delivery of yet another brand new B737-800 (NG) when the aircraft arrived from the Boeing factory in Seattle / USA earlier in the week. This latest addition to the fleet will allow Kenya Airways, according to their press release, to resume flights to Madagascar and add more frequencies to Luanda / Angola in coming weeks and meet growing traffic expectations now that the economic recovery has taken full hold and passenger numbers on all routes are once again climbing.

KENYA HOTEL SALE ENQUIRY GETS MORE TIME
The Justice Abdul Majid Cockar led official inquiry into the circumstances of the highly controversial sale of the Grand Regency Hotel to the Libyan government got another month time to complete its report, after it was established that a complex net of allegations needed to be investigated and many more individuals may have to appear for interviews and to help with the investigations. In parallel a parliamentary committee is also scrutinizing the sale, which has developed into a major scandal and already cost the former Finance Minister his job.

Libya has in the meantime also calmed down after an initial round of diplomatic broadsides and strongly worded comments trying to sweep the commissions aside, which included a message from Libyan leader Gadaffi delivered to the government in Kenya by a personal envoy.

In a related development it was learned that the Tanzania Airports Authority is to become a fully autonomous body.

COURT RULING ON KCARS: FIRST ROUND TO KCAA
The much-awaited ruling by the High Court to have the implementation date of the new Kenya Civil Aviation Regulations delayed until the main case is heard, was read out today. The court in its Ruling declined to vary its initially issued orders and grant the prayers sought of staying the implementation of the Kenya Civil Aviation Regulations pending the hearing and final determination of the suit, on the basis that such a variation of the orders might be detrimental to the interests of the public. So, the KCARS are now in force, with all its consequences for air operators and pilots.

KENYAN LIGHT AIRCRAFT CRASHES INSIDE SOMALIA
A Kenya-registered aircraft, carrying ‘miraa’ or ‘khat’ to Somalia, reportedly crashed yesterday not far from Mogadishu, while attempting to land. Early reports from the scene indicate that there were no survivors and the crew on board died at the scene. Miraa is a major export item from Kenya’s Meru area and consumed in large quantities in Somalia. No cause for the accident was available.

CONGO SEEKS BELGIAN HELP FOR CONSERVATION
Considering the recent outbursts of regime leader Joseph Kabila against Belgian “meddling” in the region, Kinshasa has now in a surprise move appointed a Belgian citizen to assist them in reducing poaching and corruption in the country’s wildlife management service. Earlier in the year was the head of the Virunga National Park – Parc de Virunga – arrested for his alleged involvement in the killing of more than half a dozen of the endangered mountain gorillas, illegal tree cutting and other illegal activities. Emmanuel de Merode, reportedly a descendant of Belgian royalty, was recently appointed a the new head of the park, bringing some hope of restored sanity and true conservation efforts to the region, where national parks in the border triangle and along the frontiers from Congo, Rwanda and Uganda meet.

Said Environment Minister Jose Endundu: “We do not have any hang ups in that respect’ and ‘Congo wants to preserve its protected areas. It needs best expertise.”

What a remarkable turn about but too late to save the now extinct Northern White Rhinos in Garamba National Park, where an ignorant and arrogant predecessor in the same portfolio in a last moment change of heart had halted an airlift that was lined up to evacuate the few surviving rhinos to a safe location in Kenya a few years ago.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

MADHVANI OFFERS 3 US SCHOLARSHIPS

MADHVANI OFFERS 3 US SCHOLARSHIPS
The Madhvani Foundation, the charitable, social and civic corporate responsibility arm of Uganda’s leading industrial and hospitality conglomerate, has now partnered with the Zawadi Africa Educational Fund to provide five scholarships for gifted but economically disadvantaged young girls with strong leadership potential. The selected girls can after completing their studies in Uganda go to the United States and take courses of their choice in leading US universities, including Ivy League members. In addition to the three US scholarships, another two were offered at leading South African universities for ICT studies.

The Madhvani Foundation was set up already in 1962, underscoring the corporate responsibility the Madhvani family always had towards their communities. They now have an annual budget of several hundred million Uganda Shillings and are a leading provider of scholarships in the country. The tourism arm of the family business owns and operates the prestigious lodges Mweya and Paraa and is presently engaged in a full rebuilding of the Chobi Safari Lodge, located in the upper section of Murchisons Falls National Park.

ANCIENT ROCK PAINTINGS UNDER THREAT
The Ngero rock paintings, located in Kumi district (Northern Uganda) are reportedly threatened by extensive quarrying in the immediate neighborhood of the caves, where the paintings are located. The Museums and Monuments Department at the Ministry of Tourism, Trade and Industry has since swung into action and began to sensitize residents of the area to preserve the art, thought to be over 500 years old. The challenge will be to eventually produce sustainable revenue from the site by attracting tourist visitors to the area, so that value can be created for the local population.

GATELY IN ENTEBBE NOW OPEN
The Gately on Nile, a well sought after “country inn home” near the Lake Victoria shores and within walking distance of the Jinja Sailing Club, now has a sister operation up and running in Entebbe. Strategically located near the turn off from the main airport road to the Uganda Wildlife Education Centre, the newly opened Gately Entebbe offers nine en-suite twin rooms, a restaurant with a menu similar to the Jinja one, including their famous quiche de maison. The adjoining gift shop and a massage facility for tired guests are due to open shortly. The Gately in Entebbe is only 10 minutes from the international airport, which includes time spent at check points. Merryde Loosemore, the proprietoress, has for the time being moved from Jinja to Entebbe to ensure the personalised service the Jinja Gately has become renowned for. Contact them for more information via email: [email protected] or [email protected] and do visit their website for the new Entebbe property at www.gatelyinn.com or the Jinja Gately site at www.gately-on-nile.com

SHERATON KAMPALA LAUNCHES SUMMER PACKAGES
As the traditional European holiday period takes many of the local expatriates back to their home turf, the Sheraton has now offered very special packages for weekends but also valid during the week, to attract visitors other than those coming for ‘business’. Generous goodies are apparently thrown into the bargain to spice up the experience value. Visit www.sheraton.com/kampala or write to [email protected]

RESIDENTS ANGRY BUT WRONG
Some embittered residents living along the boundaries of the Tooro-Semliki Game Reserve recently had their crops destroyed by the Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) enforcement personnel and promptly sought protection from other government organs, using however patently wrong arguments. The residents, many of whom had extended their small scale farms into the reserve, were given a year in mid 2007 during which to collect their harvests and move useable plants and roots but seemingly ignored the instructions. The Semliki reserve, described by this correspondent in a related article as a “prime piece of African wilderness real estate” has attracted increasingly more tourists in past years due to its biodiversity and variety of landscapes, which reach from rainforests along the Albertine escarpment to lake flats towards Lake Albert itself, with riverine forests, savannah and wetlands thrown in for good measure. The residents did apparently not find much sympathy however and other parts of the adjoining communities have reached agreements with UWA over revenue sharing and other benefits. Communities in different parts of the country have successfully forged partnerships with UWA over the past years and made substantial strives towards turning the conservation efforts in their immediate neighborhood into improvements in their infrastructure and lives in general, paid for by park entrance fee sharing schemes.

INFLATION RUNS ON
Figures just released by leading economists indicate that inflation has now reached nearly 14 percent, with similar figures obtained from Tanzania while Kenya’s inflation is said to be in the 30 percent region. Fuel prices continue to remain at near unaffordable levels for much of the population and food prices, including greens, have literally exploded in past months. The inflation trend hence added a whopping 3 percent since last month, but the economy is seemingly still powering on, fuelled by rising demand for Ugandan products from mainly Southern Sudan. Inflation in Eastern Africa is, however, nothing in comparison though to Zimbabwe where in spite of a recent currency reform, which turned 10 billion Zimbabwe Dollars into a new 1 Zimbabwe Dollar is still running at astronomic rates of nearly 3 million percent.

KENYA AIRWAYS LAUNCHES AVIATION TRAINING CENTRE
In a move setting the Kenyan national carrier further apart from other airlines in the region, KQ has now opened its ground breaking aviation training centre. The facility is reportedly already being used for KQ staff but is said to go commercial next year. Courses on offer will cover ticketing, management skills, supervisory courses and importantly engineering courses which will be supported by KQ’s own maintenance base facilities at Embakasi.

AIR TANZANIA NEWS UPDATE
A ministerial statement in parliament this week reaffirmed that Air Tanzania has indeed started operations to Dodoma and was about to serve four more domestic destinations across the country, such as Kigoma, Tabora, Songea and Shinyanga. The development is thought to stir up the domestic aviation market with competition, as ATC could not serve all domestic routes in past years due to lack of suitable aircraft. However, recent aircraft deliveries have turned the trend and the Tanzanian public will be keen to see improvements in service delivery and greater choice.

RWANDAIR PRIVATIZATION REGROUPS
News were received from usually well informed sources in Rwanda, that the privatization exercise was halted when Brussels Airlines did not submit the required financial proposals, after coming out on top of the applicants class. It appears that an Italian airline’s proposal was lacking in substance and they eventually withdrew the bid, as its sister airline in Uganda continues to struggle in the face of adverse market conditions. This left expected frontrunner Brussels Airlines, but the latest development probably reflects the hard times airlines are falling on in the face of exploding fuel prices and other operational cost increases. Regrets have already been expressed over this development, which had raised many hopes and expectations that SN would establish a stronger foothold in the East African market.
A new player, however, is thought to have positioned itself to step in to the breach by the names of Fly540. The Lonrho Africa-backed airline, which is already operating from Kenya into the region and has recently established a Ugandan operation too, is thought to have quietly made contact with Rwandair and there is speculation amongst aviation industry observers that a partnership with Rwandair or even an outright participation in the airline as the government in Kigali was initially seeking, may be on the drawing board or indeed near. Should the information be correct, it would be good news for Fly540 as well as for Rwandair, strengthening cooperation in the region and offering quality services albeit through a low-cost operational model. Fly540s Uganda operation could upon start up even commence code shared flights between Entebbe and Kigali, where only recently Rwandair upped their once daily service to double daily.

RWANDA CONSERVATION GETS A BOOST
MTN Rwanda last week offered over 200 connected phones through ORTPN to volunteer groups along the Virunga Gorilla National Park, to facilitate a better flow of information aimed at greater protection of the prized animals. The donation was initially announced during the gorilla naming ceremony held last month in Rwanda, a now annual event drawing huge media and visitor attention to the ‘land of a thousand hills’. The phones were given to community groups, NGO staff, park officials and other governmental and non governmental staff working in volunteer and other capacities for conservation. Well done indeed.

RWANDA SURPASSES TOURISM EARNING TARGETS
Statistics just availed indicate that Rwanda has earned US$80 million for the first six months of 2008, about 20 percent ahead of the target for this time of the year. The data were presented to the public by the Office of Tourism and National Parks (ORTPN) director general Rosette Rugamba and the director of the National Institute of Statistics during the week in Kigali at Hotel Mille Colline. ORTPN attributed the success in part to the annual gorilla naming celebrations Kwita Izina, which has drawn much global attention to Rwanda and over the past years brought many celebrities to the country, all of which was used in a systematic and sustained marketing and PR campaign for the country.

It was also revealed at the time that six more revenue sharing projects are due to be launched in coming months, giving communities neighboring national parks and reserves a share of the tourism proceeds in an effort to create ownership and draw support from the people living near parks for conservation measures.

Wolfgang’s East Africa tourism report

UWA GETS READY FOR TWO NEW GORILLA GROUPS

UWA GETS READY FOR TWO NEW GORILLA GROUPS
Efforts over the past years are nearing conclusion, as two additional habituated gorilla groups are to be added for tourism purposes at Bwindi National Park over the next few weeks. This will bring the number of available gorilla tracking permits at Bwindi to a maximum of 48 a day, provided all groups are available for visits and one or another are not being rested on advice of the Uganda Wildlife Authority veterinary services. Each permit presently attracts a fee from foreign non-resident visitors of US$500, while locals understandably pay a more affordable figure.

It is also understood that UWA is presently already looking further into the future and may have identified one or two more groups, which could be habituated in coming years without compromising on conservation and protection of the prized animals, which reportedly now number between 350 and 400.

UWA has now entered a period of trials for the newly-habituated groups and will progressively allow up to eight tourists to visit them, but within 4–6 months full-scale tracking is expected to be in place, ready for the high season 2008/9. The new groups will also alleviate constant pressure from tour operators for more permits to be made available and hopefully bring some closure to issues surrounding the Nkuringo gorilla group, where greed for permits had triggered a campaign to dishonor binding contracts between UWA, the Nkuringo Community Trust Fund and their sponsors AWF and USAID.

The addition of the new groups will also further strengthen UWA’s drive towards economic sustainability to eventually meet all their recurrent and future investment expenditures.

ROAD COMPLETION FAILURE UPSETS KAMPALEANS

The so-called Northern bypass, routing heavy transit traffic around the city and aimed to decongest the Kampala city center and through roads, seems again delayed in its completion. Salini, an Italian construction company also working on the Bujagali hydroelectric dam project, has time and again sought extensions of their completion deadline. The project, largely funded by the European Union, was initially due for handover in late 2006 and will soon be two years overdue and reportedly also massively over cost. The company blames rains and terrain conditions, unacceptable excuses for most observers, as they had ample time to study the terrain before submitting their bid; while rains are part of the annual weather cycle, this is also nothing new. Uganda government officials, led by Works Minister John Nasasira, expressed their displeasure over the inexplicable delays and now raised the option of either imposing heavy penalties on the contractor or else resort to a full termination of the contract, which would of course lead to further delays in the completion of the bypass. Some parliamentarians have also suggested that the company be formally blacklisted and excluded from any future contracts in Uganda. EU officials in Kampala, too, have expressed their disquiet and are also reviewing their options, which could lead to Salini being banned from future EU-funded construction projects across the region. No senior Salini staff was willing to comment on the record, but one managerial staff known to this correspondent and demanding anonymity spoke of a “witch hunt” over “small things.” Small thing, indeed, when the road completion is now delayed by nearly two years and has suffered massive cost overruns.

FLY 540 CHANGES SCHEDULE

Within months of starting operations between Nairobi and Entebbe, Fly540, the region’s first true low-cost carrier, has now made slight adjustments to its schedule in response to clients’ wishes and market demand. The airline offers two convenient morning and evening flights between Nairobi and Entebbe. Only Kenya Airways flies more often than Fly 540 between the two countries – up to four times a day, while Ugandan upstart Air Uganda continues with two daily frequencies in the absence of sufficient loads on that route. This latest development will support the growing market share of Fly540 in Uganda and Kenya, where their attractive fares have taken the market by storm. No information was available as yet on their new Ugandan airline venture and if they have secured an Air Operator Certificate from the Uganda Civil Aviation Authority to commence operations.

This comes at a time when International Air Transport Asociation’s latest monthly report indicates a general reduction in traffic for Africa airlines, with a few exceptions of the stronger networked carriers belonging to one of the global alliances.

KENYAN MINISTER FORCED TO RESIGN OVER HOTEL SALE

Kenya’s Finance Minister Amos Kimunya was earlier this week forced to resign his office after vowing to “rather die than resign” only days earlier. The Kenyan parliament had earlier censured him and demanded his resignation, but this was initially rejected by higher authorities. A full inquiry will now go underway to establish the true market value of the Grand Regency Hotel, thought to be several times the price it was sold for in a cloak and dagger action and others involved in the suspicious transaction. A further threat is looming over the sale by Kenyan Lands Minister James Orengo to cancel the transaction and not enter new owners into the lands registry. The resignation will also have an impact on the already fragile balance of ministerial portfolios of the coalition government of President Kibaki, as Mr. Kimunya was one of his cornerstones in the power games with the ODM fraction of Prime Minister Odinga.

VAT ON TOURISM DROPPED

The sudden departure of the Kenyan Finance Minister Amos Kimunya also led to the prompt abandonment of his proposals made during the annual budget presentation of adding Value Added Tax on tourism products like safaris. The Kenyan tourism industry had taken exception to the tax plans, not only as the country is still under recovery from the post election violence, but also to keep the country competitive in its pricing for overseas tourists. With a global recession looming, this may affect the holiday pattern as disposable incomes shrink while the expense for fuel, heating and food has rocketed in past months and any price increase may keep tourists away or divert them to more affordable destinations. Hence, the tourism sector in Kenya had a good case for the scrapping of the tax proposals, which are expected to be formalized in parliament soon.

AIR TANZANIA FLEET ‘FUNDAMENTALLY SOUND’

Efforts by opposition members of parliament in Tanzania to smear the national airline Air Tanzania, backfired last week. The airline had earlier on suffered some delays when their fuel suppliers demanded immediate payment of arrears before pressure on them ensured that fuel deliveries resumed. Management of the airline pointed out that government’s payments towards clearing old debts had not come through in time and that this was a severe burden on the company. Most of those accumulated debts, including for fuel, are carried forward from the days when South African Airways was involved with ATCL and was eventually shown the door after “messing up” Air Tanzania, as a reliable source put it to this correspondent. Allegations over the technical state of the airline’s new A320 and the Q300 aircraft were also dismissed by aviation experts as apparently the opposition parliamentarian got his facts wrong when using data associated with the airline’s former B737-200 fleet, which has since been expired. The A320 was formerly on the FAA register and is about 10 years old while the Q330’s came from the UK registry, in other words both previously supervised by top-notch regulatory bodies. Information has also been availed that the maintenance contract for the A320 is with Air Mauritius, an airline with impeccable records and a first-rate reputation.

Rumor has it that it was former disgruntled ATCL staff more recently retired, who fed wrong information to the opposition MP, lending even less credence to the allegations made. It would be a repeat case of former ATCL employees trying to throw mud at the airline and rabble rousing by using willing politicians to do the dirty work for them.

ZANZIBAR NOT AN INDEPENDENT COUNTRY

The Tanzanian Prime Minister felt the need to clarify in a parliamentary session in Dodoma last week, that indeed Zanzibar was part of the United Republic of Tanzania and not a separate country. He referred questioners to the Tanzanian constitution’s clauses 1 and 2. He also pointed out that there were Union matters and non-Union matters which were also clarified in the constitution and which regulated the respective powers of administration. Sections of the Zanzibari community continue to press for separation from the United Republic and are seeking independence, and it has often been noted in meetings of East African Community committees and other meetings that the position of Tanzania taken on issues is influenced by Zanzibari issues, often played out in public instead of coming to meetings with an agreed position.

LIGHT AIRCRAFT CRASH KILLS TOURISM MINISTRY OFFICIAL

It has been reported from Arusha that the Deputy Director for Wildlife in the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism, together with one other wildlife officer and the pilot, died when their light aircraft went down on a flight from the Arusha Municipal Airport to Loliondo. The crash occurred in the early afternoon last Friday when the single engine Cessna apparently hit the side of a hill. No formal accident cause had been established at the time of going to press, but a full TCAA investigation is now said to be underway.

TANZANIA RAILWAYS TO IMPROVE SERVICES

Reports from Dar es Salaam have confirmed that the company is set to import nearly 50 new railway carriages for passenger transport from India. At the same time, several carriages are being rehabilitated in Tanzania every month to bring them up to modern standards. It was also learned that there will now be separate trains from Dar es Salaam to Kigoma and Mwanza for the convenience of passengers. Previously the trains had to be separated when reaching Tabora.

RWANDAIR DOUBLES FLIGHTS BETWEEN ENTEBBE AND KIGALI

After years of serving the Rwanda – Uganda route once a day in the evening with a 30-seater turboprop Dash 8 aircraft, the airline has just announced the introduction of a second daily flight. The new connection will operate every morning, making one-day trips between the two capital cities now a reality. The tourism and business associations in both countries have welcomed the extra flight and was “long overdue” to quote one leading Rwandese businessman with extensive business interests in both countries.

About the author

Avatar of Linda Hohnholz

Linda Hohnholz

Editor in chief for eTurboNews based in the eTN HQ.

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