Board Members express confidence in Tourism Chairman

The industry meeting called by the Tourism Board attracted a huge response from operators and observers who came to hear what the Board had in mind for the future. The meeting was held at Club Raro on Thursday evening 9 April.
Tourism Minister, DPM Robert Wigmore also attended the meeting chaired by chairman of the board, Tata Crocombe who was flanked by his fellow board members Te Tika Mataiapo Dorice Reid, Teresa Manarangi Trott, Thomas Koteka, Ewan Smith, Robert Skews and Iaveta Short.
Crocombe urged everyone to leave the past in the past and to look to the future for the good of the industry and of the country as a whole because in their view, tourism is the ‘bloodline’ of the country and provides employment opportunities for our people.
The DPM was then invited to address the gathering and said this was the first time he been invited to a Tourism meeting and had not realized how many people were involved in tourism until he saw the number of people in attendance. He asked that whatever happened in the past should remain in the past and to work together for benefit of all.
The Tourism Minister’s words were echoed by each and every individual board member addressed the gathering and expressed their total confidence in the chairman with Te Tika explaining that each and every board decision had been approved by all the other members.
Te Tika spoke of spirit of Kia Orana and sacredness and respect which are the three pillars of our culture and community.
Teresa Manarangi-Trott referred to budget bidding and the new Tourism Budget Policy which was published in the CI News recently and is now available on the MFEM website; while Ewan Smith referred to the need for upgrade of infrastructure and being up against ‘stiff opposition’ from other destinations and to stop the practice of taking last year’s budget and tweaking it and presenting the same old thing.
Thomas Koteka referred to moving forward toward a more ‘strategic’ system rather than the ‘same old same old’ in marketing, whereas Robert Skews said that he was lucky because he had been away for 2 months in Europe (for marketing purposes) while his fellow board members carried the load and devised the Budget Policy Statement and he gave them all due credit for a brilliant job done. Skews compared our ways to that of Fiji Tourism which holds regular meeting plus seminars with the industry and the results showed in their increased figures. .
Iaveta Short said he had joined the board only one month ago and could see how much work the members put in and had come to realize that our economy is so vulnerable (eg dependence on airline access, being cyclone prone ) and looking at his fellow members, he could see they were ‘the best team on board’ and was proud to join them.
No doubt the public show of support for the chairman is as a result of the industry disquiet over the resignations of three key tourism personnel: former CEO John Dean, Acting CEO Glenda Tuaine and NZ manager Chris Ingram and the audit of the board’s role in the controversial marketing campaign in late 2009.

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