Outbound tour operators in Britain are still selling Kenya, but Malindi, and Zanzibar, Tanzania, are being chosen as alternatives to Mombasa for the beach extension of safari packages.
Last week, Thomson and First Choice reportedly cut short the holidays of UK travellers in Mombasa. Both companies said they were cancelling flights to the city until later in the year. This followed an advisory issued by the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office (FCO) against “all but essential” travel to Mombasa island and within 5km of the coast from Mtwapa creek in the north to Tiwi in the south.
Ash Sofat, Somak CEO, told Tourism Update the company had not needed to cancel any trips to Kenya following the FCO’s warning. However, Sofat added that the company was sending clients to Malindi or Zanzibar as part of their safari package. He added that safari was the mainstay of the company’s business and it would continue to send travellers to the national parks in Kenya, which had been unaffected by recent security incidents.
Roy Davies, of World Discovery, has also not needed to cancel bookings. “The interest in Mombasa has been low for some time and the majority of our passengers taking beach extensions have been travelling to Zanzibar after their safaris,” he says. World Discover is also continuing to sell Kenya, but Davies points out that while the main safari circuits are being sold, Nairobi is used as a gateway only, and clients are no taken to any of the city areas that are considered unsafe.
“Our tours do not go into Mombasa city or to any of the ‘warned against’ areas of Kenya,” says Vivian McCarthy, GM Acacia Africa UK. He adds that the company is still selling Kenya, which forms a part of its East Africa programmes and remains a very popular destination.
These comments confirm reports that occupancies in Mombasa have dropped.
Sofat says the company’s advice to clients is governed by the FCO, which has the necessary intelligence to advise on security issues. McCarthy echoes this sentiment. “We would not travel into an area if the advisory issued was ‘against all but essential travel’ into that area,” he says. “Moreover we might still not travel into an area if the FCO did not have an advisory issued but we nevertheless considered, from information received locally , that it was unsafe to do so,” he adds.
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