It is unfortunate that Justice Malala’s recent opinion piece, in which
he describes Kimberley as “just a big hole”, is so very true.  It is a
shame that the supposed ‘sparkling city’ is indeed a “shabby” mess,
which does not inspire tourists to explore the province beyond
Kimberley’s borders. Tourist attractions in the city, such as the
McGregor Museum and the Rudd House, are not receiving optimal support
from government and cannot be optimally maintained. The William
Humphreys Art Gallery, a national museum, has a yearly maintenance
bill of R100 000 against a budget of approximately R6 million. And, as
Justice Malala points out, the buildings are set in a city with
“cracked pavements”. The facts are not likely to inspire much tourism
to the province.

While the South African tourism industry has grown with more than 10%
in 2014, the Northern Cape tourism industry couldn’t even grow with
half a percent. This is despite the fact that there has been so-called
high impact projects like the Bloodhound Land Speed Project, which is
supposed to introduce the Northern Cape to the rest of the country. In
2014, both foreign and local tourists spent an average of one day less
in the province and spent significantly less money. Tourists are
spending their time and money in other parts of the country, but they
are less and less likely to do it here.

What is disturbing is that the provincial tourism industry is failing
to grow when there are at least two provincial departments and two
provincial entities working on tourism. The department of Economic
Development and Tourism and the department of Environment and Nature
Conservation as well as the Northern Cape Tourism Authority and the
Northern Cape Economic Development Agency all have units and
programmes dedicated to tourism. The department of Sport, Arts and
Culture also pledges significant resources to the so-called
‘mega-events’ like the Kimberley Diamond Cup, which is supposed to
draw tourists to the province. Ultimately, all this system achieves is
to duplicate functions and double expenditure without seeing any
concrete returns on investments.

We call on the MEC for Finance to streamline this inefficient system
and to establish one unit with the sole task of driving tourism in the
province. We need one unit with the capacity and financial resources
to do a good job and not an endless string of entities fumbling around
in the dark.

Issued by DA