Amended UBC regulations are like rearranging chairs on the Titanic

Source: Tourism Update, 13/01/2019

In fact, amending the wording has simply provided an obfuscated
message to our overseas tourism partners and travelling consumers,
and has only served to sow further confusion among local industry
stakeholders who are now left to explain what this means in
practice for tourists coming to South Africa.
One need only read the recent article in the Daily Telegraph to
see how one of our major source markets has interpreted the
amended regulations. The headline reads: “Parents should still
carry birth certificates despite relaxed rules, warns South
Africa”. Need we say more?
According to the amended regulations, where a child presents a
passport containing the details of his or her parent or parents,
an immigration officer shall not require the child to produce a
birth certificate. Our key source markets typically do not issue
passports including the names of both parents, so this amendment
will not ease access in any way.
The Gazetted regulations also state that children who are foreign
nationals and who are visa exempt are strongly advised to carry
supporting documents as stipulated in the advisory since they may
still be requested to produce them when travelling through a port
of entry of South Africa.
In essence, we are leaving it to the discretion of the immigration
officer to, at random, request additional evidence and question
what he or she deems as a “suspicious” individual.
What training has taken place in this short period to equip these
individuals to make this decision and deal with these detained
individuals? As organised tourism, we have no knowledge of this.
Would you risk coming to a country when there’s a chance you may
pique the interest of an immigration official and be refused entry
for 24 hours while you source documentation? Where will they keep
your young family until you produce the proof they want?
Why ever would you put your family through such a gauntlet when
there are so many other destinations that are rolling out the red
carpet to welcome this lucrative tourism segment?
While yesterday’s Tourism Update article references the Home
Affairs Ministry as having consulted with IATA as the
representative of the airline industry, it must be said that IATA
is a bureaucratic regulatory body. We have not heard from foreign
carriers flying to South Africa that, as a result of these amended
regulations, their check-in counter staff will cease demanding the
documentation when families check-in.
And until we hear this, in our view the amended regulations change
nothing.
In fact, despite this, airlines have been advised by the local
airline association, that proving parental consent for travelling
minors is still a requirement and that it “strongly” recommends
that parents and/or accompanying adults continue to carry the
required documentation with them.
If we want to position South Africa as a family-friendly holiday
destination, this requirement must be scrapped unequivocally and
the message disseminated to our key markets must be clear: we are
open for business to any family, not just those that fit the two-
parent mould, which frankly in this modern society, is ridiculous
to expect as the norm.
By maintaining any requirement to produce an unabridged birth
certificate or related documentation, even in certain
circumstances, simply places a further deterrent to families who
may be considering a holiday in South Africa.
If the President truly wants to see the tourism sector deliver the
numbers and associated economic growth and jobs, he needs to
intervene and scrap these regulations outright so that the
industry can support his attempts to stimulate the economy.
The simple point of departure, Mr. President, is to sit down and
ask the private tourism sector, the very people who can deliver on
the tourism growth you desire, what it is we need to grow.
What we should not have done is start with the exact perpetrators
of the draconian regulations that have retarded our industry for
over three and a half years. The result has quite simply been the
fudged wording of those same regulations.
Start with us, Mr. President. We are a well-organised industry, we
can be accessed easily, and we are ready to get to work.