Minister: Opposition smear campaign has impacted tourist arrivals

Minister of Tourism, Moosa Zameer has said that opposition smear campaign had led to tourist arrivals falling below the expected number.

In answer to a question posed by “Sun”, Minister Zameer said that the opposition smear campaign was affecting the tourism industry of the country.

He said that though they had previously expected 1.5 million tourist arrivals this year, the figure had been lowered to 1.4 million due to the challenges they were facing.

“There are challenges with the tourist arrivals. We didn’t see the growth we anticipated,” said Zameer.

“Talk of Maldives being a terrorist country is more harmful than the Al-Jazeera report,” added the minister.

He said that Ministry of Tourism had increased marketing campaigns and expenditure in order to battle the negative image being associated with the country.

“The truth is; we have had to increase our expenditure on marketing. It includes hiring consultants. Up until the recent past, we had only promoted the Maldivian tourism industry by participating in fairs. But now we have hired consultants to help us battle the negative allegations,” said Zameer.

There is growing concern in the international community over the number of Maldivians travelling to Syria and other troubled areas to join in on terrorist activities – figures that the

Maldivian government insists are blown out of proportion.