At least 7 000 hotel employees in Kenya’s resort towns of Malindi and Watamu in Kilifi County are still out of work, despite reports of a tourism recovery.
About 80% of hotels in the two towns, which had closed for the low season in April, reopened last month for the high tourist season. However, they are currently experiencing low occupancies.
Kenya Union of Domestic, Hotels, Educational Institutions, Hospitals and Allied Workers Kilifi County Branch Secretary, Michael Yaa, said, of the 9 000 workers who were sent home during the low season in April, only 2 000 are back at work.
Kenya Association of Hotelkeepers and Caterers Malindi and Watamu Branch Chairman, Philip Chai, confirmed that most of the workers were still at home as hotels had few guests.
The resort towns in Kilifi County are hardest hit.
Charter flights from Europe to Moi International Airport, Mombasa, are currently fewer than 10 a week compared with 40 a week during the peak period of 2011.
In June, German holiday airline Condor reintroduced flights from Munich to Mombasa while a Polish airline, Small Planet, inaugurated a weekly flight from Warsaw to Mombasa. Condor operates three flights a week, one from Munich to Mombasa and then to Zanzibar, and two flights from Frankfurt to Mombasa.
From Italy, only Meridiana Fly and Neosair operate two flights a week each to Mombasa.
Tourism players had expected a boost in tourist arrivals following the reintroduction of flights from Munich and the introduction of flights by the Polish airline.
But Somak GM, Paul Kurgat, attributed the tourism decline in Malindi and Watamu to the majority of the Italian tourists who arrive at Moi Airport being in transit to Zanzibar.
He argued that tourists were heading to Zanzibar due to the perceived terror threat at the Kenya coast.
However, Kurgat said that in Nairobi, tourism was doing well due to scheduled flights at Jomo Kenyatta International Airport. “In the Maasai Mara National Reserve, lodges and tented camps are also busy, owing to the wildebeest migration spectacle,” he said.
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