Airlines currently flying into South Africa are British Airways, Lufthansa, KLM, Air France, Virgin Atlantic, Swiss, Kenya Airways, Egyptair and Turkish Airlines. Picture: Supplied FRUSTRATED traveller Bianca Lutz-Kokuner has described her seven-day quarantine at the Holiday Inn Express Hotel, Stansted, in London as “a waste of money, time and energy.”
Lutz-Kokuner is one of the many South African travellers who were forced to spend close to R50 000 to be accommodated in a mandatory 10-day quarantine hotel in the UK after the country implemented strict bans on South African travellers, due to the discovery of the Omicron variant.
This was the second time the UK placed South Africa on the red list in a period of just two months. Cape Town International Airport is the second busiest airport in the country and the third one in Africa. Picture: David Ritchie/African News Agency/ANA Rosemary Anderson, national chairperson of the Federated Hospitality Association of South Africa (Fedhasa), explained that the R1bn lost in the first 48 hours of the red listing at the end of November was a drop in the ocean compared to what had been lost over the past three weeks.
“We are still counting the short, medium and long-term collateral damage that the second red listing caused to many companies that depend heavily on international tourism.
“Many of these businesses had just managed to survive the last red listing and had borrowed funds to provide capital to carry them forward into the summer where they could try to stabilise their precarious financial situation,” she said.
Anderson added that the second red listing snuffed the oxygen out of the sector and even resulted in businesses being shuttered.
“What governments around the world don’t realise or perhaps don’t value, is the mental, emotional, financial, and social toll of their actions.
“History will not look kindly on the actions global governments have taken over the past two years in the ‘spirit’ of stemming the spread of Covid. It will take many years to heal,” Anderson concluded.
Lutz-Kokuner concurred with Anderson’s statement, stating that the lifting the ban had its positives and negatives. Bianca Lutz-Kokuner, describes her seven-day stay at the Holiday Inn Express Hotel, Stansted, in London as a waste of money. “For seven days, which were meant to be 10, we spent over £228 per day for service that wasn’t even up to standard.
“Yes, we are very happy that families from UK and South Africa can see each […]