The Tribune

By NICO SCAVELLA

AFTER a leading international travel website dubbed Nassau one of the world’s “unfriendliest” cities, Tourism Minister Obie Wilchcombe yesterday said the Bahamas is “a friendly nation” but agreed that “much more work” needs to be done with regards to the tourism process.

Mr Wilchcombe’s comments were in response to an article posted on the Cond� Nast Traveller, cntraveler.com, entitled: “The 2014 Friendliest and Unfriendliest Cities in the World.”

Nassau ranked tenth in the “unfriendliest” list, which was topped by Johannesburg, South Africa, and featured four French cities – including Paris and Monte Carlo – also poorly rated.

The site read: “Although Nassau has ‘wonderful beaches’ and great bars, the lack of infrastructure and activity immediately outside its well-trodden tourist areas might explain travellers’ reservations about the place.

‘Heavenly, but I recommend staying on site at one of the big hotels. The city itself tends to be somewhat unsafe,’ one of our readers said. Another agreed that ‘it didn’t feel safe walking around outside the tourist areas,” while another added: “It’s very nice if you are in the right places, but very mundane, if not depressing in others.”

Mr Wilchcombe said that combatting reports of that nature is “constant work,” as he said that his ministry would have to first look at the types of questions asked and how those questions ultimately led to their conclusion.

He also said he “appreciates” those kinds of surveys because “they are teachable moments for all”, but attempted to disprove the site’s assertions, referring to statistics to validate his claims.

“The truth is we’re a friendly nation,” he said.

“The world knows that; that’s why our return count in some of our islands are very high like Bimini – 79 per cent. That’s because people continue to return because of the friendliness of the Bahamian people.”

Airlift

“The reality for the Bahamas is we’re a tourism destination on the incline. We’re moving back to where we used to be. Our numbers are looking better than they have looked in a long time. We still have much more work to do. We need more airlift but we’re getting some.

“We need to ensure that there is consistency and stability throughout the country; Grand Bahama is on the rise again, so we’re making some strides, but in the process we have to fix everything.”

Mr Wilchcombe is no stranger to international surveys bashing the country’s safety issues. In June the Latin America Monitor said that the rising murder rate in the country would pose a risk to the tourism sector and growth as a country.

“We believe that rising murder rates in the Bahamas, including some recent killings of foreign tourists, could weigh on the islands’ business environment,” the analysis read.

“If the trend continues unabated, or if there were to be particularly high profile incidents that gained coverage in foreign press, the attractiveness of the Bahamas as a tourist destination could deteriorate, threatening the islands’ medium-term growth outlook.”

Mr Wilchcombe stressed that it must be clearly illustrated by his ministry and Bahamians to tourists that the Bahamas is more than just “sun, sand and sea” and added what his ministry has in place to better combat the negative reports.

“One or two individuals have caused the Bahamas’ reputation to be snared to some degree, but that’s not the Bahamian people,” he said.

“Our job every day is to get out to the world and tell the world the truth.

“Show the world our beauty, show the world the people of our country.

“In fact you’re going to see very shortly our new programme ‘Tourism Today’ hosted by Nikia Deveaux, and we’re also engaging now finding ways on the internet to ensure that we have a constant flow of information, whether it’s Youtube or a 24-hour channel, getting information out there on a continuous basis that we believe would drown the negatives, but show the positives.

“People must leave here knowing that everything was better in the Bahamas. So it’s a part of the campaign that we have to continue to give the messages out.

“Constantly reminding our people that we are in a global competition, that there are 1.3 billion people who travelled last year all over the world; that there was a time where the Bahamas didn’t have many competitors in the Caribbean – now we do.

“We don’t have all the inventory and airlift that we require, but what we do have we must keep filled. We must keep the planes filled coming to the Bahamas. We’re doing well, but we still have a lot of work to do.”

Pleased

As for the country’s crime situation, Mr Wilchcombe said he is pleased with the Ministry of National Security’s efforts, despite there being a few shortcomings along the way.

“I think they’re doing a good job.

“The minister of national security together with the commissioner of police and others are doing a tremendous job, they work with us and they are responding very quickly. But we do have one or two individuals that I believe when they take stock will appreciate that they have done more harm than good to their country.

“As a country we must not believe that we are complete. We still have a lot of work to do and we can never believe that all is well.

“We must always look at ourselves and be the greatest critics of our own country as we seek to better it.

“If we are able to take away the negatives then nobody could challenge the greatness of this country.”

Auckland, New Zealand, and Melbourne, Australia, were jointly rated the friendliest cities in the survey.