Palace to conduct familiarization tour for Hong Kong travel agencies

MANILA, Philippines - Malacañang said yesterday the government, led by the Department of Tourism, would conduct a familiarization tour for Hong Kong travel agencies, security people and media to show improvements in the country’s protection of tourists after the hostage crisis on Aug. 23, 2010.

Hong Kong Chief Executive Donald Tsang said the black alert on the Philippines would stay unless the country could prove it is doing something to keep tourists safe.

The Philippines was placed under black alert with Syria where hostilities and human rights violations had been reported.

Chinese Ambassador Liu Jianchao said Beijing would not likely interfere in Hong Kong’s decision being an independent administrative region while the Department of Foreign Affairs said the Philippines had been consistently working to have the black alert lifted.

“The Department of Tourism even prior to the anniversary has been coordinating with the Hong Kong Security Bureau... to launch a familiarization tour and this is geared towards travel agencies, hopefully, some members of the Hong Kong Security Bureau and also media. The idea is to show to them the improvements that we have made and also the various tourist spots that Philippines has to offer,” Lacierda said.

“And, hopefully, we were supposed to present a demonstration of the Crisis Action Force that will be part of the familiarization tour that we are going to do in coordination with the Department of Tourism. So we are planning to do that sometime in September to October,” Lacierda said.

He expressed belief that the government had done enough to address the concerns of tourists.

“Remember the first concern of the Chinese Foreign Ministry when they were here? I think a day or two after the incident-the President (Aquino) met with the Chinese Foreign Ministry and some officials of the Hong Kong SAR (Special Administrative Region), and their primary concern was the request that we ensure the safety of the tourists. I think we are doing that and we continue to do it. We have installed tourism police or tourist cops; we’ve got the night courts,” Lacierda said.

“So far, they have been working, again, it’s not yet perfect but we continue to upgrade and orient the tourist police to have a firm approach towards... and also a more friendly approach to tourists.”

“But, yes, we continue to improve our services and all in the perspective of making sure that all tourists will be safe and also our own nationals,” he said.