Ms Tourism World president blind to suffering Zimbabweans

By Tererai Karimakwenda
6 September 2005

The president of the controversial Miss Tourism World beauty pageant, which has come under fire again for promoting tourism to Zimbabwe, says he has never noticed the shortage of food and fuel in the country. Defending his company's involvement with Zimbabwe's ministry of tourism, John Singh told us that he goes to Zimbabwe with camera crews and stays in hotels without being exposed to the empty shelves or the suffering people displaced by the government's cleanup operation.

Miss Tourism World promotes beauty pageants in countries that are identified to be in need of revenue from tourism. Their website currently boasts a 30% rise in tourism to Zimbabwe, all allegedly due to their last pageant, which was held in February 2005. Singh admitted that his company was paid two million U.S. dollars by the Zimbabwe government to host the event. This at a time when there is no foreign currency for food and fuel. Singh justified this by claiming he has created jobs for the locals by boosting tourism.

Singh also complained about being singled out when British Airways, South Africa Airways and Barclays Bank were operating in Zimbabwe. We challenged him on that, insisting that those companies should not be there either. Singh said he would be willing to sit round a table with those companies, to discuss whether any of them should be doing business in Zimbabwe.

Asked if he cared about the rare animals being killed illegally and the allegations of corruption against the tourism minister Francis Nhema, Singh said he was not aware of any of it. He said he was not a political expert, and his interest lay solely in promoting tourism.