IT IS inevitable that OR Tambo will lose
its status as Africa’s most important
hub. Located near the tip of Africa, its
geographic location could hardly be
worse as it is en route to nowhere,
except for traffic between Asia and the
east coast of South America.
Even so, travellers from the north
choose to fly over their destination in
Africa and on to Johannesburg and then
back to their destination because of OR
Tambos’s user experience and its good
connections.
But it is losing its position fast.
Since taking office as Minister of Home
Affairs, Malusi Gigaba has managed to
destroy the user experience. Starting
with the unabridged birth certificate
fiasco and current directive to capture
biometrics from all foreign travellers
without adequate staffing, he has
single-handedly made OR Tambo an
airport to avoid.
Competing hubs must be delighted,
and not just obvious ones like Nairobi
and Addis Ababa. Mauritius is working
flat out to be the gateway to Africa
from the east. Dubai, Doha
and Istanbul are chiselling
away very successfully at
Johannesburg’s position.
Turkish Airlines is now flying
to over 50 cities in Africa.
Smaller cities are also being
served. This month, Ethiopian
Airlines began a service to
Gaborone and Windhoek.
Qatar started a service to
Windhoek last month. Will
Emirates be adding the
new Victoria Falls airport
to its network? All of these
passengers have had to transit
Johannesburg until now.
When KLM also starts its
flights to Windhoek later this
month, the people of Namibia
will have a choice of a shorter
direct flight to super-efficient
Schiphol and a transfer to
anywhere in Europe, or waiting
up to three hours to clear
immigration in Johannesburg
followed by a longer flying
time.
Some countries in the
sights of extremists are now
taking biometrics on arrival.
South Africa started this
in July. It is being done for
security reasons and for a few
BRIC arrivals where the visa
applicants could not apply in
person overseas.
The hole in this security
operation is enormous.
Seventy nine percent of
foreigners arriving in July did
so over land borders where no
biometrics are collected.
At the same time biometrics
came in at SA airports,
Treasury has issued a
directive to rein in government
spending so Home Affairs
cannot employ the additional
staff needed to gather the
biometrics of 2,5 million
foreign travellers who cross
our borders in a month.
It needs to stop immediately
until they have the capacity.
Someone needs to knock
heads in this department that
is doing untold damage.
For instance, under pressure
from a high-level interministerial
commission, they
have redrafted the regulations
governing minors and
unabridged birth certificates.
But it has been done in such a
way that it will have almost no
positive impact. Changes have
been made, but ambiguity
remains. So much so that
the association representing
the airlines that are expected
to enforce the regulations at
point of departure, has said
airlines will have no option but
to continue to deny boarding
to minors who are not carrying
original UBCs.
Every day there are traumatic
scenes at airports around the
world as check-in staff are
compelled to deny boarding
to one or more children in a
family group. Home Affairs is
either unaware, or does not
care.
It will be a scary downward
spiral when traffic in the rest
of Southern Africa moves away
and airlines are forced
to reduce their services to
ORTIA. The wonderful air
capacity we now enjoy will
shrink and, with it, many of
the tourism jobs we are all
counting on.
