Local Tourism Politics Puzzle This Travel Writer Very Much Indeed

Alert! Despite flooding that has taken almost a dozen lives and wreaked much damage all across the Garden Route, Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool says the half-drowned parts of the coast will not be declared official “disaster areas”.

The reason? He’s worried about the kind of message any such declaration would send to those currently planning their trips to what is admittedly one of the jewels in the SA tourism crown. The message he apparently doesn’t want you to hear is: the flooding was helluva bad, and we’ve just begun a helluva rebuilding effort, backed 100% by a helluva lot of cash from the national government.

No, seems he’d rather the message you got was: it was just a few drops of rain, the rivers were a little high, and everything’s back to normal now, so come on down and splash around in our delightful southern seas (never mind that you won’t be able to see your feet for all the mud).

SA Logue: safeguarding you, dear reader, from boondoggle. (I wonder how the rather wet residents of the southern Cape feel about Rasool’s approach?)

• Follow the Flood Story: IOL | iAfrica | The Citizen