Kisumu hoteliers step up renovations, eye Africa cultural festival boom

Hoteliers in Kisumu County have stepped renovations on their facilities with an eye on the business boom on the upcoming Africa Festival of Arts and Culture (Festac) that is scheduled to take place in the lakeside city from August 25 to September 1, 2024.

The fifth edition of Festac was set to take place in May this year but was pushed to August due to heavy flooding in the Western Kenya region at the time. 

However, hoteliers from the Lake Victoria region now say that they are ready to host delegates who will be attending the international event.

“As a region and more specifically as a city our growth has always been quite good. As we speak we have a consolidated bed capacity of 10,000. This has boosted our capacity to host several domestic and even international conferences,” said Robinson Anyal, the chairman of the Lake Victoria Tourism Association.

Mr Anyal noted that the recent anti-government protests that rocked the country saw most hotel bookings cancelled by uncertain guests resulting in heavy losses.

 Excitement

“But now things are beginning to look up for us as peace has been restored,” he said, beaming with excitement.

His sentiments were echoed by Ms Vicky Akinyi, Sales Manager at Selella Resort.

“The past few months were extremely tough for us in the hospitality industry. However, we are now optimistic that with the return of normalcy, we will be able to recover soon from the beatings,” she said.

 “As an industry, we can only thrive when there is peace and that is why when you walk around Kisumu and there’s calm we truly appreciate it,” explains Mr Peter Ayeko, General Manager of Best Western Hotel.

The hoteliers now want the Kenya Tourism Board (KTB) to encourage more travellers to make Kisumu one of their destinations of choice as the industry largely relies on the domestic market adding that the last classification by the Tourism Regulatory Authority (TRA) rated the region as number one.

“A lot of developments have happened after the last classification, so it will be important for TRA to start with us, particularly developments from 2014 to 2019. Just recently we hosted Afri-cities in 2022 and so we are ready for the African Festival,” added Mr Anyal. 

Tourism

Masiola Okinda, head of sales and marketing at Le Sovereign Suites said that they were already receiving inquiries and bookings from guests planning to attend Festac.

“I urge KTB to open up the Western region tourism circuit which has been closed for quite a while now. I would also like to appeal to the government to come in and support us through conferences, seminars, and workshops because right now we largely depend on non-governmental organisations and corporates,” noted Mr Okinda.

The Lake Victoria Tourism Association brings together 14 counties within the Western Kenya Tourism Circuit. The objective of the association is to promote leisure tourism within the counties and position the region for the international market.

Foreign tourism is currently estimated to be less than five percent but this is expected to increase during Festac.