Speaking to journalists at a press conference in Harare today, Tourism minister, Walter Mzembi, said the MoU would enable the two countries to engage each other through a formalised institutional framework.
“It is inconceivable that 34 years after Zimbabwe’s independence and 51 years after Kenya's independence, there is no bilateral MoU,” said Mzembi. “The two countries should be speaking to each other through an institutional framework.”
Mzembi emphasised the need for African countries to embrace new social media and information technology in communicating the true African picture.
“The MoU should capture information technology and ensure that it is used to communicate the true African message effectively.
“The future of tourism in Africa lies in ICTs. We should brace for an era where we can utilise the social media creatively to portray the true image of Africa but we should budget for it and ensure that we are active on the social media platforms,” said Mzembi.
Mzembi distanced his ministry from a purported “Zanu PF” Twitter account which is urging tourists to visit Zimbabwe and not risk their lives by going to Kenya.
One tweet that has received a lot of criticism from social media users describes Kenya as unsafe. Mzembi said Zimbabwe was instead taking lessons from Kenya considering that the country had a good tourism brand.
He said: “We need to harmonise our hotel and tourism standards and exchange ideas, staff and students between college of tourism excellence called Utalii and the school of hospitality in Bulawayo.”
The Kenyan ambassador to Zimbabwe, Josephine Awuor, said her country was committed to promoting its tourism sector despite terrorist activities in that country.
“Terrorism is a global problem and it is not peculiar to Kenya. As long as the security forces are alert, we are committed not to give up on the tourism product,” said Awuor. “The numbers of tourists in Kenya may drop but we believe that it is a temporary situation.”
Post published in: News