It’s Time To Reform The United Nations World Tourism Organisation: A Conversation Between Two Giants Of Global Travel And Tourism Journalism

Due to the disconnect between the United Nations World Tourism Organisation [UNWTO], a specialized agency of the United Nations in the field of travel and tourism since 2003 and some of its members, I Lucky Onoriode George, 2006 Winner of the European Commission Lorenzo Natali Prize for Journalists Reporting Human Rights and Democracy engaged Juergen Steinmetz, Publisher, eturbonews.com on the way forward for the UNWTO.

 Lucky George:  Good morning, Thomas.

Juergen Steinmetz: Good evening, George from this part of the world. How are you?

Lucky George:  Lagos is fine.

Juergen Steinmetz: I’ve never been to Lagos. I made it to Abuja one time, and I was there for the Commonwealth Tourism Conference. It was a really good experience, I have to say, and I love the way the women dressed in their colourful clothes. Also, the men, I mean, everyone dressed well and it’s really like a different world.

 Lucky George: Thomas, I guess you enjoyed your stay overall besides that the people are very colourful and flamboyant.

Juergen Steinmetz: Somehow, but one thing that has stuck in my head since that visit and a major lesson that I will never have a desert in the dark anymore. We were at the Abuja Sheraton Hotel for dinner and your minister was speaking and they had problems with the electricity. When the electricity went off, I was at the buffet trying to get a dessert. In the dark, I grabbed something thinking it was a desert and put it into my mouth for a bite, behold, it was a glass thing, and I almost screamed in the dark.

Lucky George: What a terrible experience.

Juergen Steinmetz: I will never forget that moment and swore never to try such in the dark again.

Lucky George: I think it’s a good idea.

Juergen Steinmetz: Desserts aren’t good anyway, you know, they have too much sugar and it’s not good, so forget it. 

Lucky George: Absolutely. Yeah.

Juergen Steinmetz:  I guess we were going to discuss the United Nations World Tourism Organization [UNWTO] as you requested, do we?

Lucky George: Yes Thomas! You and I know the UNWTO very well, but very few people know the history. However, for the purposes of fact, I was privileged to have been introduced to a man known as Ignatius Amaduwa Atigbi, former Secretary General of the then Nigeria Tourist Association, now Nigerian Tourism Development Corporation [NTDC], apex tourism agency in Nigeria.

I became his student because I was willing to listen to his stories of how he began his career as a journalist with Reuters in West Africa and later to Fleet Street in London.

From there on, I was educated on the history and the formation of the UNWTO and the institutionalization of the World Tourism Day Celebration. formation of the United Nations in Acapulco in Mexico in 1970.

True, the African Travel Commission [ATC], that decided that their members should continue to receive governments’ support, the status of the International Union of Official Travel Organisation [IUOTO] based in France must change.

The members agreed to it and the chair asked if there was any lawyer in the house to guide them and behold, the only lawyer present was a Nigerian by name Odubayo who was a staff of the Nigerian Ministry of Commerce and Industry.

He drafted an agreement that was voted on by members and by 2 am in the morning of September 27th, 1970, the motion of the adoption of renaming IOUTO to World Tourism Organisation [WTO] was adopted.

Juergen Steinmetz: I didn’t know that. That’s so fascinating.

Lucky George: Yes. And I have the documents, the minutes of meetings.

Juergen Steinmetz: I did not know that and it’s all new to me. But you have been in that part of the business a lot longer. I started in the travel business in 1978, but I was more in the practical part. I wasn’t involved in organizations. My first job was in Morocco, in Africa. I was a tour guide, not really a tour guide, but sold land arrangements on a cruise ship for Morocco. So that was my very first job. I remember. So, I didn’t have any worries with the board and tourism organization.

Lucky George: That is the story and journey of today’s UNWTO. However, by 1971 in Ankara, Turkey at the XX11 General Assembly Meeting of IUOTO, the African Commission under the leadership of Nigeria’s Ignatius Amaduwa Atigbi, proposed that September 27th, being the date that transformation of IUOTO to WTO was made possible be set aside and commemorated annually as World Tourism Day.

So, the idea is to commemorate the achievement and look at what are the necessary adjustments that need to be made.

Juergen Steinmetz: Interesting!

Lucky George: Despite this firsthand account story, there was no single document to corroborate voices too from the tourism agency.  We just don’t have any of the documents. So, what I did was to take it as a challenge, and I decided to travel from Lagos to Spain on a visit. Then. Luckily for me, I have been communicating with a Slovenian guy who was the head of UNWTO communications department at that time. Right. I wrote to him and informed him of my intention to come to Spain to seek evidence that Atigbi was the man who proposed the celebration of World Tourism Day in his capacity as the Chairman of African Travel Commission [ATC].

He was skeptical though, but he promised to help me once I arrived in Madrid which was exactly what he did. We’re looking at the minutes of meetings. Luckily, we first stumbled upon a copy of a minutes of meeting of 1971 in French where the history was well documented and behold, we also located the English version.

That was how I returned home to the tourism agency and the ministry with my findings. In summary, I instigated that a letter be written to the Secretary General of the UNWTO at that time and demand that the African guy deserves to be membered and celebrated.

Gladly, there was no objection to Nigeria’s call and UNWTO under Rafai Taleb, wrote back to the ministry and promised to honour Late Ignatius Amaduwa Atigbi at the 2009 International World Tourism Day Celebration that was hosted by Ghana.

Thomas, that was the story behind the UNWTO and World Tourism Day Celebration.

Juergen Steinmetz: Incredible!

Lucky George: To cap it all, the Nigerian government through the Federal Ministry of Culture and Tourism congratulated me and the sum of N200.000. You know I love African tourism and I guess you still recollect my Zimbabwe exploits.

And of course, you knew very well when the trouble started in Zimbabwe, I was the one that was contacted by the Chief Executive Officer, Zimbabwe Tourism Authority [ZTA], late Karigoke Kaseke, who wanted me to come to Zimbabwe with some journalists from around the world.

Juergen Steinmetz: Sure!

Lucky George: I invited you as the Publisher of eturbonews.com to come, but you eventually sent your Editor in Chief at that time, Nelson Alcantara and we were in Zimbabwe for 18 days.

Then two or three years later, Zimbabwe co-hosted the UNWTO General Assembly Meeting with Zambia at Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe and Livingstone in Zambia. That massive turn of event was because of the groundwork that you and I used our platforms to change. Again, sadly, the Zimbabwe Tourism Authority and the ministry failed to pay me the balance of the agreed fee for my services. Shameful!!!

Juergen Steinmetz: You know my story with the UNWTO and CNN Task Group well too. We were the one who really brought CNN into the picture because Anita Mendiratta, who was based in Cape Town, South Africa didn’t know other people; and we started introducing her to people. Though, the idea was really that at the end, we were going to get major advertising and thought, Oh, this is great. CNN, You know, CNN did good. Anita wrote several excellent articles. She started doing this. We profiled organizations and individuals. But unfortunately, we never got the advertising. I guess everyone is selfish enough.

Lucky George: I know Anita Mendiratta very well and our last encounter was a bitter one in the Gambia of which I saved Gambia $1.5 million World Bank tourism funding that the country director was willing to part with for a bogus publicity contract with CNN that I scuffled.

Anyway, that is a story for another day.

Juergen Steinmetz: Yeah, yeah, yeah. You know my story with UNWTO.

Lucky George: Absolutely. Absolutely. The big question is that, how do we make the UNWTO function other UN specialized agencies, where each of the continent would have tenured representative like the World Health organization [WHO] and International Labour Organisation [ILO], from all the continent instead of relying on career director whose interest are their personal benefits.

Juergen Steinmetz: You are right.

Lucky George: All reputable UN agencies work closely with local and international media, the UNWTO. This one doesn’t pick calls nor reply to mails.

Juergen Steinmetz: No, they don’t.

Lucky George: It’s sad, but we cannot continue to tolerate the excesses of the UNWTO.

Juergen Steinmetz: You have a very valid point. I have had the same experience with them over the years.  Maybe mine has different reasons, but Marcelo Risi, the media guy, has not responded to anything.

Ever since Zurab Pololikashvili took over, I have not had any phone calls. As a matter of fact, they have banned me from attending their press conferences, specifically at the World Travel Market, where we are an official media partner, and I couldn’t attend. They had hired a bodyguard who was standing there with my picture and to make sure I didn’t get into the hall.

So, they’re not inclusive in any way. They don’t like criticism and they don’t respond to criticism. And I guess he makes any decision he wants. And no one really cares. I mean, it is kind of sad because even when you look at the general assemblies and the other events they have, the members, many of the ministers, as you rightfully said, change all the time. The new ones from many countries don’t know what the old ministers did.

Lucky George:  So, Thomas, what do we do because most African countries just use UNWTO as a leisure trip all time and are paid for by their government of which Nigeria is majorly one.

Juergen Steinmetz: And it’s probably not only in Africa because there is similar situation in many countries around the world, and if you don’t have the bigger players and I’m talking about the UK, the United States, Canada among others, the UNWTO will remain a ragtag agency of the UN.

Lucky George: It’s a mess.