Egypt’s tourist official laments tourism industry

Head of Egypt’s Tour Guides Syndicate Hassan Al Nahla said that Egypt’s tourism industry suffers from a state of collapse during the recent years, blaming the Russian plane crash for the elimination of the attempts aiming to revive the vital sector.

He added, “There are over 18 thousand tour guides suffering from unemployment due to the suspension of tourist movement, saying that they face the danger of begging.” He stressed that the international reactions to the incident is not satisfied and reflects a state of intolerance towards Egypt.

He expressed his aspiration that the Russian side will honor its commitment over the return of Russian flights to Egypt during the coming period. He stressed the need for taking serious measures to activate tourism in the Egyptian resorts of Sharm Al Sheikh and Hurghada as soon as possible.

Regarding the scale of the losses incurred by the tourism sector during the last period, he stressed that the situation had begun to enter the stage of stability, and indicators began to rise for the first time after the January 25 uprising but what happened caused heavy losses.

He revealed the presence of about 18 thousand tour guides in Egypt rely entirely on cultural tourism, not beach, noting that they lost during the past five years their work and source of income, and only 10% of them managed to work during periods of popularity. They suffered from increasing losses because of the burden of living expenses as well as housing, schools, and the problems of social insurance.

He added that the most important problems facing the sector currently are the foreign workers who come with the tourist groups and harm the interest of the Egyptian guide, as well as they provide false historical information and harm the national security of Egypt. Therefore, He added, these workers should be prevented especially because they do not have a work permit and do not pay taxes like the Egyptian guides.   

He called on Egypt’s Minister of Social Solidarity to cancel the benefits of insurance on guides and postpone payment, while changing the current laws, to allow the guide of electronic marketing, which will increase the number of tourists visiting Egypt to the double. He stressed the need for allocating temporary unemployment allowance for tour guides who do not work until the return of tourism.

 He added that Tourist Guides Association pointed out that the tourism sector suffers from a big problem over the past period, blaming the lack of coordination between its different sectors in the ministry, including the Tourism Promotion Authority, the Federation of Tourist Chambers, tourist guides, hotel workers and companies. To confront crises, he said the different institutions working in the sector should work together. He stressed that a large number of workers in tourism expressed their anger over the current state of mismanagement inside the tourist organization

He appreciated President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi for his decision to activate the Supreme Council of Tourism which will help in the return of tourism to Egypt again, because the ministry cannot play this role alone.

He warned that domestic tourism cannot solve the tourism crisis in Egypt stressing the need for activating the vital sector to increase the hard currency, which will come only from the Arab and foreign tourists. He stressed that the importance of internal tourism lies only in maintaining the continuous rotation of the activity and keep the sector from extinction and non-layoffs.