LIVINGSTONE, which is just a few kilometres from the Zambezi River and the border with Zimbabwe, is a hub for visitors to the Victoria Falls – Zambia’s iconic tourist attraction.Although it lost its national capital status in 1935, the city has over the years been re-branded as the nation’s ‘tourism capital’ due to its status as the home of the world-renowned waterfall which was declared a World Heritage Site in 1989.
Minister of Tourism Rodney Sikumba was the Livingstone Tourism Association (LTA) board chairperson when the town, whose economic mainstay is hugely reliant on tourism, was going through one of the most turbulent times – the coronavirus pandemic.
He knows well how hard it was for Livingstone residents to get by.
It meant businesses, mostly tour operators and lodges and hotels, would either fold or lay off workers just so they could stay afloat.
International travel bans and travel restrictions meant loss of business for many tour operators, and lodge and hotel owners, because international nationals, who are arguably the big spenders in the city, were either not visiting or came in trickles.
Whereas Mr Sikumba could not have avoided the COVID-19-triggered job losses, his immediate remedial measure was to work towards attracting local tourists.
His call, during that period, was for tour operators to incentivise local tourism through reasonable pricing so that locals could be lured to sample local tourism packages.
“The overwhelming support as evidenced by the influx of local tourists and holiday-makers is a clear indication that the Zambian tourism sector can thrive with the support of Zambians even under challenging circumstances such as COVID-19,” he once said. “...and, as such, as LTA, we shall continue to incentivise local tourism through reasonable pricing for enhanced access to tourism services and further invest in the development of additional tourism products for all to enjoy.”
Whereas it is evident that foreign nationals are the biggest drivers of the tourism sector, the role that locals play cannot be underplayed.
It is for this reason that during the Independence Day long weekend, as people were trooping to Livingstone for the Zambian Breweries- sponsored Mosi Day of Thunder music festival, Mr Sikumba, the Tourism minister, was happy that for the first time, in two years, the country’s largest brewer drove tourism traffic into Livingstone for both locals and foreign nationals.
An estimated 10,000 – maybe even more – from Zambia as well as neighbouring Botswana, Zimbabwe, Namibia, and South Africa trooped into Livingstone for the music extravaganza.
“Tourism goes hand in hand with entertainment. The ministry has been categorical with regard to entertainment. This is an event that draws people from far and wide,” Mr Sikumba said.
Obviously, more traffic translated into more business and economic activity for the town – and Michael Moonde, a local taxi driver, was no exception.
“I have not seen this many people here in Livingstone in a long time,” he said. “But I am not surprised,” he continued. “You see, from the time they relaxed the COVID-19 restrictions and the world slowly started returning to normalcy, we knew that the city would come back to life.”
Hillary Kashempa is the current LTA board chairperson. He took over from Mr Sikumba when the latter resigned to run for political office.
He says the annual music festival brought a lot of business to the town. “It’s actually one of those events that people had been looking forward to because of the kind of traffic it comes with. People come from far and near just to experience it. To us, that is business on its own,” he said.
Mr Kashempa adds: “We are glad that, after a two-year hiatus, the organisers pulled it off. It is the biggest attraction in terms of numbers, which we had over the long weekend.”
Nearly all lodges and hotels in the tourist capital were at full occupancy. “We had a number of arrivals from neighbouring countries that came specifically for the event and took part in mostly boat cruises and game drives aside from visiting the waterfalls and the two museums,” he said.
“People had a tough time finding accommodation,” said Aaron Masiye, who had traveled from Ndola with his partner. “Luckily for us, we had made prior arrangements. It’s our first time coming here (Livingstone) and we are glad that we timed our trip perfectly.”
However, for a tour guide that sought anonymity, it wasn’t a very good weekend.
He said much as there were a lot of people in town, most of them were local tourists that do not appreciate the value of a tour guide.
“Most of them think they know their way around the city,” he said. “But what they don’t know is that we know so much and we can even help them get bargain deals. Most of them (local tourists) fear engaging a local tour guide for fear of being exploited. Truth is, there are bad guides there, but not all of them are.”
Companies such as Abseil Zambia made the most out of the Mosi Day of Thunder. Abseil Zambia is one of the tour operators that provide nerve-racking activities that call the adrenaline to action such as abseiling or rappelling, gorge swing, high wire and also the flying fox.
“We have reduced our prices to close to half for anyone that is coming here with a ticket to the Mosi Day of Thunder. The idea is we want to encourage people, especially locals, to indulge in these activities,” said Mulele Sikaneta, Abseil Zambia operations manager.
The event drives local tourism and draws thousands of people from across the country and beyond.
Zambian Breweries decided to go with an entirely local line-up to invest more in the local artistes and have them perform on this platform.
“The Mosi Day of Thunder is a celebration of Zambian arts, music, and culture. The event brings together a number of artists on the stage to celebrate Zambia,” said Zambian Breweries head of marketing Sibajene Munkombwe.
Among the local artistes that performed were Macky II, Bobby East, T Sean, Princess Natasha Chansa, Towera Kaira, and Slim The Hitmaker.
Livingstone Mayor Constance Muleabai said: “We are promoting local artistes. We want to campaign for everyone to know that local artistes are there and that we can perform at the highest level, even as Zambians.”
This article was also published in the Zambia Daily Mail newspaper of Saturday, November 12, 2022
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