... the following article was published in Tobago News... The Greens and Tourism in Tobago To answer the question if officials in T+T managed the case of the unfortunate Greens well, two other questions should be answered first: How serious does Tobago take its tourism-industry, how professional does Tobago want to promote tourism? And second: Do the Greens harm tourism in Tobago? If Tourism in Tobago is not considered as that important and the media attention of the Greens doesn't hurt Tobago, then no official in Tobago should be blamed as it seams that the Greens received best medical treatment possible and much empathy from officials and the people in T+T. Crimes, as horrible as they are, can happen in each country and a member of each nation can become a victim anywhere. To receive any kind of compensation, the Greens had to make their claims in court and judges would decide. No official in T+T should feel blackmailed. Huge amounts of money are spend to advertise and promote a tourist destination. Adds in papers, on the radio or on TV are expensive - subsidizes for airlines also. Some advertising is free of charge: The World-Cup 2006 in Germany was first class promotion across the globe for T+T - and free of any charge. The Greens are negative promotion in the UK - also free of any charge. Yes, a person from T+T might get beaten up by a British racist in London. Racist attacks harm the reputation of a country or a region. But would such an incident harm the Tourism-product of the UK as most visitors to the UK are from Europe, the States or Asia? Trinbagonians travelling to Sweden, Switzerland or the UK might not be of highest importance for these countries. The UK rather sees growing problems with visitors from T+T for various reasons and citizens of T+T might need Visas for travelling to the UK in the future. Visa regulations can be seen as evidence how welcome or wanted one nationality is in another country. Visitors from Pakistan or Jemen might not be very welcome in the USA and they have very intense visa-restrictions to follow (to blow up another plane or building?!) During the Cricket World Cup nationals of Sweden and Switzerland also needed Visas to enter T+T - seams that they were not really wanted that much. Yes, T+T has huge amounts of natural resources and Tobago has the central government of Trinidad to ask for support. Other Caribbean Islands don't have any natural resources and depend on tourism. Many foreigners visit Caribbean Islands for sun and relaxation but some for sex and drugs or money-laundering. Some of them get robbed or killed as for example Jamaica is not known to be more peaceful than T+T. However, it seams that other islands do all they can to ensure that robbed or killed foreigners don't catch the headlines to harm the countries reputation. In fact, Tobago might be a safer place than most other Caribbean Islands. Many tourists are surprised how safe they feel on the island after they heard so many bad things about the crime situation on the media. If Tourism is considered as important, then it has to be managed in a professional manner: Starting with immigration at the airport, followed by taxi-drivers, quality of accommodations, hotel-employees, tour-operators, tour-guides, restaurants, security, crime detection, justice-system and promotion / marketing. If people in T+T think that the country does not depend on the UK and its visitors and what people in the UK think about T+T, then I would say that the case of the unfortunate Greens was handled very well. Visa-restrictions for visitors from the UK could be implemented to demonstrate far going independence from the UK. But if tourism is considered as important in Tobago and visitors from the UK are welcome to spend their money on the island to provide jobs and income for many employees and business people, then there is room for improvement to promote and manage tourism in Tobago... Jorg Kilian ... zurück zur Startseite ... Tipps: dig inkasso Bernhard Soldwisch webtains abzocke Schulabschluss Berlin und Urlaub in Tobago ist besser als Schulabschluß in Tobago und Reise nach Berlin...