The seven enemies of Philippine tourism

If Secretary of Tourism Cristina Garcia Frasco is really sincere and conscientious, and she wants to win in the competitive tourism arena in Asia, she should slay the seven enemies of tourism right here in our country. She cannot, of course, win over the series of typhoons and natural disasters that make our tourism sites inaccessible or dangerous to foreign and local tourists. She cannot fight fortuitous events and force majeure.

But she should look at the following factors that are controllable. First are the dirty, overcrowded, and poorly-managed airports exacerbated by poor traffic management in the airport vicinity as well as road to and from them. Second is the unreliable, dishonest, and unregulated land transport system. Third, hotels and their personnel who are not properly oriented, much less skilled in handling tourists and managing their visit and stay in the Philippines. Fourth are tour companies and their staff who are lacking in adequate skills, proper attitude and appropriate social graces befitting a hospitable country like ours. Fifth are local security personnel and police authorities who are called upon and trusted by foreign tourists to respond with a sense of urgency and concern whenever tourists are victimized by swindlers, thieves, and purveyors of scams.

Sixth are the airlines and their managers and personnel who want to amass profit without honor, and who behave as if the tourists are liabilities rather than assets. Seventh are the folks in the communities who make the tourism sites dirty, difficult, dangerous, and foul-smelling.

All of these make our tourist destinations obnoxious to visitors. This writer is a frequent traveller around the Philippines and outside of it. I just completed visiting 51 countries in 100 days from southern, northern, and central America, eastern and western Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. I have enough data, information, and documents to make a comparison. As of today, to be brutally honest about it, we cannot win over Thailand, Malaysia, Indonesia, and even Vietnam.

Here is more about the poorly-managed and topsy-turvy airports. On October 16, Sunday, after my Integrated Bar MCLE lecture in the Waterfront Hotel, I was at the Mactan-Cebu International Airport to check in to Terminal 2. The car that brought me there left immediately because the guards were rushing it and were so unforgiving, only to be told that the high and mighty airport management abruptly changed the check in counters to Terminal 1 without notice to departing passengers. I had plenty of luggage and there was no airport service to help me carry all my things. And there were many foreigners with me who were murmuring what kind of country this is. How could I defend my dear Philippines? Do you think such a mess up would endear us to visitors?

The airline that booked me got my contact number (I had a business class ticket by the way) and must have known about the change of terminals. But this airline that claims to be the heart of the Philippines did not have the heart to call me and tell me to change from Terminal 2 to 1. That is just a simple matter but, if the Tourism secretary is serious, she should do something about this. I do not have enough space to discuss all the enemies of tourism one by one but if the Department of Tourism wants to interview me, I shall tell them why I loved Amsterdam, Greece, Chile, and Puerto Rico. I will tell them that I lived in Kuala Lumpur for three years and I learned why one million tourists go to Malaysia every month, while the Philippines cannot even have a million a year.

But if the Tourism officials and the airport, hotel, and airline management are not humble enough to look at their own respective turfs and get them in shape, then we shall again get the title of being the sick man in Asia. And with topsy-turvy airports, neglectful airlines, and uncaring hotels, we do not need a hurricane to destroy our tourism goals. We are all capable of sabotaging our own tourism aspirations.

We have all the makings of destroying the Philippine brand. We do not need competition to slay us in the tourism market. Our own people and our own institutions have the full capacity to destroy our own country in the eyes of the world. I pause for a reply from DOT.