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Personalities
in the News
BLOOD, SWEAT AND TEARS:TRACING THE FOOTPRINTS FOR
TOURISM GROWTH
 A
number of tenants underpin the necessary work of
the Tourism Branch at the Department of
Environmental Affairs and Tourism (DEAT) &endash;
creating conditions for responsible tourism growth,
developing and promoting tourism and encouraging
transformation within the tourism industry. In
examining real and philosophical insights into how
to achieve these, it is perhaps proper to
interrogate the character of drivers to this
process.
Writes:
Edwin Sipho Rihlamvu
 It
is by now rhetoric that South Africa has reached
unprecedented growth levels, surpassing
expectations of a variety of research predictions
and with pride earning itself a place amongst the
Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative for South
Africa's (ASGISA's) priority sectors.
Dr
Patrick Matlou, Deputy Director-General for
Tourism at DEAT is arguably one of the most
important contributors to this profile. Having
joined DEAT in 2002, at a time when the tourism
industry was grappling with issues of interpreting
legislation, transformation, dislocated provincial
coordination, low international profile, transport
and airlift constraints. Understandably so and in
an environment where there was inadequate human
capital within the Tourism Branch, arresting these
challenges seemed impossible to achieve.
Adopting
a cliché at the time that "Blood, Sweat and
Tears" would see us through, Dr Matlou led a tiny
team on a drive to recruit the most qualified
historically disadvantaged individuals to join the
tourism industry in an effort to creating a much
more formidable human capital stable.
" We
decided that if we were to drive transformation and
equity within the broader tourism industry, it
would then be fitting to walk the talk and effect
such in our employment strategies" recalls
Matlou.
Affirms
Mr Benny Boshielo, Chief Executive Officer of
Limpopo Tourism and Parks: "My first impression on
interacting with Dr Matlou was, "wow, this man is a
tourism institution." His grasp on tourism issues,
his passion on the industry, his people management
skills, his resilience in the most difficult and
challenging times, his love for his people, and
above all his parenthood and custodianship for
those of us new in the industry, qualified him to
this title of an institution. Dr Matlou has
endeared himself as one of the architects of
tourism growth in our country".
Tourism
Legislation
One
of the challenges that beset the Branch was to
entrench proper understanding of legislation in the
tourism industry by all players. This because past
pieces of legislation were skewed and biased
towards a minority few, hence aggressive resistance
to the new order. As a consequence efforts were
made by others to discredit tourism legislation as
anti-growth, and retired it as doomed to deplete
arrivals to South Africa's shores.
Hence
the challenge was to be unrepentant about driving
strict adherence to policy stipulations, no matter
how unpopular they would be with others. Again the
"Blood, Sweat and Tears" approach became handy as
Dr Matlou and his charges fought battles akin to
that of "David and Goliath" in order to navigate
resilience amidst this resistance and at times
hostile media. Indeed this determination has
delivered handsome fruit!
"Dr
Matlou's contribution to the tourism industry is
incalculable. He is a living legend of all the
milestones of post-apartheid policy formulation,
rooted in the wisdom of responsible and sustainable
tourism development," comments Advocate Cawe
Mahlati, Chief Executive Officer of Gauteng Tourism
Authority.
Transformation
The
tourism tapestry in South Africa has for a long
time been characterized by a number of unwelcome
anomalies in terms of equity, ownership,
demographic spread and inequitable business
landscape. It would thus be expected that any
attempt to obviate this misdemeanor and align it
with the brand-new South African democratic
dispensation would be met with fierce
negativity. We
have spoken of two miracles that have transformed
South Africa: the miracle of political
transformation, that enabled the nation to forgive
the past and accept a new political order; and the
miracle of economic stability, which resulted in
reduced inflation and a healthy debt-to-GDP
ratio.
Our
third miracle needed to be that of economic
democratization. We needed to transform the tourism
economy so that it is fairly shared among all
population groups, unemployment is reduced and
poverty is eradicated" wryly noted Dr Matlou,
recalling the amount of work that was put in
towards aligning the tourism face to make it what
it is today.
Sindiswa
Nhlumayo, Head of the BEE Charter Council at the
Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism
(DEAT) confirms the rationale behind government's
aggressive attendance to transformation: "We see
BEE as a benefit to the economy and business in
South Africa. BEE enables economic growth and by
bringing on an empowerment partner will give
businesses access to new markets, which in turn
will lead to business growth".
Coordination
at different tiers of government
In
1994 the main challenge was to dismantle the old
"apartheid structures" and reorganize them in an
inclusive, democratic and egalitarian orientation.
The same principle was called for within the
tourism sector. Furthermore, it became painfully
evident that provincial tourism structures found
themselves desperately wanting in terms of
understanding their roles and responsibilities.
DEAT had to lead the painstakingly long-drawn
process of putting provinces on a wining streak!
Recognizing
the tireless work that is attributable to Matlou in
the above regard, Mr Ndabo Khoza, Chief Executive
Officer of KwaZulu Natal Tourism Authority notes:
"As Tourism KwaZulu-Natal we have been privileged
to have had the opportunity to work with Dr Matlou
for a while. He has managed to put the tourism
agenda to a wider audience, particularly public
sector stakeholders".
Furthermore,
there are now coordinated approaches to tackle
issues that negatively affect tourism such as VISA
restrictions, safety and security, transport and
airlift etc. The impact of this is monumental as
all stakeholders began to take ownership of the
tourism value chain and are committed to its
maintenance and growth.
For
instance, thus far, the implementation of the
airlift strategy, the result of a strong
partnership between DEAT, South African Tourism,
the Department of Transport and the private sector,
has shown impressive increases in capacity to bring
tourists to South Africa. Between September 2006
and January this year, rights for almost 1,4
million additional seats per year were
secured.
Profiling
Tourism Internationally
In
more ways than one South Africa has emerged as a
recognizable voice in the international tourism
arena - vehemently pushing for Africa to be
accorded equal status in terms of tourism marketing
and development as with other first-world
countries. "Africa
as a continent has so much to offer. The splendour
of Africa with its unbelievable potential is highly
desired and has the opportunity to position itself
amidst this high growth global economic activity as
a prime global tourist destination. After all,
Africa is still custodian to the wild lands and
cultures and has a deep concern for nature in its
natural form" said Mr Ousmane Ndiaye, Regional
Representative for Africa at the United Nations
World Tourism Organization (UNWTO).
Africa's
tourism growth is, however, hindered by various
factors. These factors include an inadequately
developed product and service base, a poor
perception of the safety of tourists, civil wars
and conflicts, often lacking infrastructure and
delivery infrastructure, insufficient international
and especially domestic marketing, a shortage of
well-trained frontline tourism staff, a limitation
of international flights, sectoral fragmentation
and weak intra and inter linkages within the
private and public sectors.
In
the above regard South Africa called for the
restructuring of the 157 countries and 300
Affiliate Members of the UNWTO to put Africa's
development firmly on its agenda. Even if South
Africa failed to be elected as Secretary-General of
the UNWTO owing to inadequate time to campaign, its
manifesto was endorsed by many member states,
especially noting the motion that the term of
office of the Secretary-General should not be more
than twice.
"Dr
Matlou supported our nomination for the UNWTO
Ulysses award. As we speak he has recommended that
we become associate members of the UNWTO" again
saluted Mr Ndabo Khoza.
UNWTO
grants the Ulysses Prize to a distinguished scholar
for an outstanding contribution to knowledge in
tourism, while the Awards are bestowed on projects
undertaken by public institutions in tourism which
merit distinction for their innovative
contributions to tourism policy, governance, and
areas of tourism such as the environmental, new
technologies, among others.
In
this case Tourism KwaZulu-Natal scooped a First
Prize, Award for Innovation in Tourism Governance,
which has placed its focus on the impacts of
tourism and on tourism as a tool for development,
involving local communities.
"The
African continent can also do much better than the
approximately 37 million arrivals or around 4,5% of
the 806 million global arrivals (2005). Africa
received only a small share, 3,1%, of the US$680
billion spent globally (2005) by tourists. The
travel and tourism sector can become Africa's
strongest economic sector for direct foreign
investment in future", reasons Dr
Matlou.
The
adoption of the NEPAD Tourism Action is in many
ways a product of relentless work that was
undertaken by South Africa.
On
another front, Dr Matlou played a leading role in
positioning the Regional Tourism Organizations of
Southern Africa (RETOSA), to market and promote the
Region in close cooperation with the Region's
national tourist organizations and the private
sector.
Attests
Mr Francis Mfune, RETOSA's Acting Executive
Director: "Dr Patrick Matlou was an active member
of the RETOSA Board. He will specifically be
remembered for his untiring and meticulous guidance
to RETOSA to develop a Monitoring and Evaluation
System (M & E) with performance indicators for
Monitoring the Institution's
performance".
Dr
Matlou's passion for Africa can be found in the
brief resume below:
He
completed his primary-school education in Nigeria
and then moved to complete his secondary education
and first degree (Political Science and Geography)
in Ghana in 1979. His dissertation was a
comparative analysis of the Battle of Iswandlwana
(1879), the Sharpeville crisis (1960) and the
Soweto riots (1976).
He
then went to England and completed a Masters in
International Relations in 1980; his thesis dealt
with the defunct East African Economic Community.
He worked in Liberia as a lecturer in Political
Science at the University of Liberia from 1981 to
1986 and returned to England where he completed his
PhD in 1992, specializing on Botswana's refugee
policy.
Dr
Matlou returned to South Africa in September 1994
after working for the UN High Commissioner for
Refugees in Kenya.
Message to
the Tourism Industry
"I
am indeed humbled to have been, in a small way part
of a process that has established groundwork for
tourism in South Africa to thrive to greater
heights. However, my message to the industry and
those that will take after us is that we should not
rest on our laurels and think we have won the
battle. I propose that a bigger war to be won is
that of transformation, so that all citizens of
this country derive an equal share from the tourism
pie, so that through tourism our lot is emancipated
from the shackles of poverty, unemployment and lack
of education," noted Dr Matlou.
Encouraging
officials to be steadfast and committed to service,
he said, "You should always count yourselves lucky
that you are able to go to work in this very
competitive industry. There are many who would
cherish the opportunity of finding employment, who
would rather work for free in order to gain
experience. Always cling dear to your work and
aspire to achieve one goal everyday &endash;
contributing positively to the life of South
Africans, from whose tax you derive a
salary".
Conclusion
At
the close of his 5 June 2007 National Assembly
debate on the Budget Vote of the Department of
Environmental Affairs and Tourism, Marthinus Van
Schalkwyk, Minister of Environmental Affairs and
Tourism declared, "…None of the achievements
that I have spoken of today would be possible
without the hard work and dedication of these
outstanding individuals whose commitment to
consolidating the achievements of our first decade
of freedom is without question".
It
is tempting, very tempting to suggest that the
Minister was actually referring to the fact that
tourism in South Africa is basking in the glory and
limelight brought about by: "Blood, Sweat and
Tears"!
Dr
Patrick Matlotleng Matlou is to leave DEAT at the
end of August 2007 to pursue other
interests.
International
Tourism Relations
DEPARTMENT
OF ENVIRONMENTAL AFFAIRS AND TOURISM
Tel:
+27 12 310 3940 - Fax: +27 12 322 5754 - Mobile:
+27 73 887 0222 - E-mail: erihlamvu@deat.gov.za
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