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The mood in Addis Abeba just a few months back was
of excited anticipation. Just before the year-long
Ethiopian Millennium celebrations commenced, the
crescendo of festive spirit brought an electricity
to the air. Scores of business with the word
‘Millennium’ finding its way into new names or a
companies latest sale gimmick joined grumbles about
rising berbere (red pepper) prices and
speculation over which renowned American pop star
would don the stage of the newly constructed
Millennium Concert Hall on Africa Avenue (Bole
Road).
But above all, people’s high expectations on the
droves of Ethiopian Diaspora expected to flock to
the poor nation with their fat pockets coming from
the West and Middle East as well as frantic
preparations to meet their demands stand out. Some
of these hopeful activities were rather painful for
others without the financial leverage to bank on a
bright year 2000.
Landlords evicted tenants en mass expecting
wealthier Ethiopians from abroad to fill the
vacancies at inflated prices. Combined with
speculation on the population influx boosting other
service fees from restaurants to clubs, the
anticipation left a sour taste in many mouths of
those feeling left out of the exuberance.
Just after four months, on the eve of the Western
New Year, many business owners and landlords have
joined this jaded crowd disappointed by realities of
unutilised capacity and faced with the necessity to
lower rents to pre-September levels to attract the
same groups evicted with zeal.
Demes, 28, is one of those entrepreneurs angered by
his decision to open a new business based on his
assumption of a huge turnout of Diaspora. A driving
instructor by profession, Demes was inspired by
discussions with family and friends on how best to
make his expertise and Diaspora needs meet for a
profitable endeavour. Transportation seemed like the
obvious answer.
Renting his Toyota DX as part of his family
business, Demes had a feel for the demand of compact
cars and decided to buy two of them. Taking a
300,000 Br loan from Awash Bank collaterised in his
existing vehicle capital, he bought two 1996 Toyota
XL hatchbacks from a car dealer based in Addis.
Demes was full of hope to began servicing the debt
before the payment schedule kicked-in six months
after the loan. His dream began to wash away as the
notorious date neared.
“No Diaspora came to rent my cars,” Demes said. “The
only users of the cars were my older customers.”
Not easily deterred, he put stock in the
government’s explanation that “the celebration is
not bounded to a few days but is going on for the
whole year”. But three months later Demes is still
frustrated by the low turnout of the Diaspora.
“I heard 700,000 Diaspora and tourists and more than
100,000 Jamaicans will come to the celebration,” he
said.
WHERE DID THE FIGURES COME FROM?
Exploring the previously optimistic Demes’ rationale
for these beliefs is a dead end. When posing the
question of where his information came from, he will
tell you he heard it from the media and he then
referred his families and friends. He is not alone.
Most of the businesses did not have clear
information about volume of expected visitors.
Scanning various media outlets before the
celebration; the numbers mentioned in their reports
vary from 300,000 to 700,000 expected visitors. The
state-owned Amharic daily, Addis Zemen,
reported in its July 6, 2007 edition that 10,000
visitors had already come to Ethiopia.
Timing was also a source of confusion. Many Addis
Abebans were of the view that all visitors would
come around the September 11 New Year.
“Based on the figures, I calculated how much profit
I could gain,” Demes said. “If an individual tourist
came with 5,000 dollars, you can guess how much the
benefit will be from the 700,000 of them.”
Others, took a different estimation approach. To
some, figures around the Western Millennium
celebration seemed like a good benchmark. They
believed that 4,000 people came for this one-day
event and planned by projecting this number out
across the year-long time period.
Seyoum Bereded, director of the National Secretariat
for the Millennium Celebration, argued that his
agency is not to blame for such discrepancies in
figures. He told Fortune that individuals
bring various figures from different sources and it
should not be taken as if they came from the
Secretariat. Despite the official figure of 300,000
from the Secretariat, he generalised what they have
been expected during the one-year celebration.
“Considering the one million Ethiopians living in
the Diaspora, we generally expect hundreds of
thousands of visitors over the span of the year
(2000 EC),” Seyoum said.
The Secretariat’s expectation is based on a simple
logic. Every year many Ethiopian Diasporas are
coming home to visit their families, especially
during holidays. From previous experience, the
Secretariat found a pattern that Ethiopians living
in various parts of the world choose different
seasons to return to their native land. Those that
came from Europe prefer the Easter holiday and those
in the North America choose Christmas and the
Western New Year, while Ethiopians from Middle
Eastern countries come back during hot seasons in
the region.
“In addition to these, the Millennium celebration
gives more reasons to come to their country,” Seyoum
said. “The regional celebrations by themselves
attract more.”
The Director used the 1,000th birthday celebration
of Harar, 526Km east of the capital, to affirm his
argument that more people will come for the regional
celebrations. When Harar conducted its celebration
for 28 days two months before the Ethiopian
Millennium, 5,000 Harari natives reportedly flocked
to there.
Demes is not convinced by such explanations.
“We heard that many Ethiopians are still coming from
around the world. The media also told us that those
returning Ethiopians are expressing their
willingness to invest in their country but where are
they?” puzzled Demes.
Henok Tadesse, duty manager of Sidama Lodge, shared
such a view with Demes. The Lodge, constructed in
under a year in a rush to meet the Millennium, is
one of those businesses that suffered from the low
turnout of the Diaspora. Opening a week before the
New Year, the Lodge did not get a single customer on
the first two weeks. Henok said that though
businessmen and other tourists begin coming after
the third week, the Lodge still did not accommodate
as many Diaspora as it expected.
With 12 rooms and self-catering, the Lodge’s
customers turned to be businessmen and international
organisations like the African Union (AU), World
Bank, European Union (EU) and African Vacation. The
duty manager said that the recommendation the lodge
has got from its customers and its official website
contributed for its current full occupation,
however, he admitted his disappointment and
frustration on the expected Diasporas.
“As anyone anticipated, we also expected to
accommodate Diasporas through the whole year,” said
Henok. “We did not get what we expected.”
FALLING BEHIND
Despite predictions, official figures on how many
Diasporas are actually coming to Ethiopia are
unavailable in governmental institutions, including
the National Secretariat or service givers like
Ethiopian Airlines. Unofficially, however, many are
beginning to cede that it may be vastly lower than
rosy expectations.
“I bet not more than 50,000 are coming,” Demes said.
For Demes, the reasons why the Diasporas are not
coming are not tangible. What he has heard from some
is that unavailability of air transportation
prevented some of the Ethiopians to attend the
September 11 celebration.
Negasi Gebremariam, a former Diaspora living for 12
years in the United States (US), supports this view.
While he was among hundreds of Diaspora that came
from his former residential area, Denver, many
others remained in the Colorado capital complaining
about the expensiveness of the air ticket.
“It is an unbelievable price,” Negasi explained that
the 2,600 dollars fee requested by Ethiopian
Airlines during the beginning of the celebration was
abnormally high.
The flag carrier, Ethiopian, announced in
June 2007 that it expected to transport 25,000
passengers for the Millennium celebration. To
accommodate this expectation and its increasing
passenger number, Ethiopian, leased two
767-300 and 757-200 Boeing airplanes in June and
July 2007, respectively. The 767 Boeing has a
capacity to accommodate 235 passengers while the 757
can carry 175 travellers. The airplanes are
dedicated to the longer haul routes in North
America, Europe and Asia.
Others residing abroad cite a calendar restrictions
related to work and school cycles. Tesgaye Asfaw,
general manager of Imperial Hotel, looked into the
official opening of the school season on East Coast
and Midwest of the United States (US). He said that
East Coast schools begin to open after mid-August
and in the Midwest it is pushed to the end of
September.
“For those Ethiopians who want to bring their
family, it is impossible to do it,” Tesgaye said.
His assessment also covered those who planned a
visit of their country using a holiday break. He
cited the fact that there is no public holiday other
than Labour Day, celebrated on the first Monday on
September around the time of the New Year. The
General Manager hoped that such visitors will come
later during the Christmas-New Year or Easter
seasons.
NEXT INFLUX
Those in the hotel and tour operator business call
the Christmas-New Year time as “peak season” of the
year. Seyoum believes that an influx of people next
to September 11 is expected in this month and the
coming January. He attributed a leave taken by many
coinciding with the two holidays, to bring
Ethiopians to home.
Marketing and Planning Department manager of Ghion
Hotel Enterprise, Mulugeta Eshete, looks forward to
getting more visitors in this “pick season”. As seen
in the last three months, the increase of visitors
not only benefited the 57-year-old Addis Abeba-based
Ghion Hotel, but its eight branches, which most of
them are founded following the historical sites in
the northern part of the country, are also seeing
increases.
“The number of visitors showed an increasing
tendency every year,” Mulugeta said. “We expected
more visitors in this year’s pick season too.”
According to the Ministry of Tourism and Culture (MoCT),
the country earned 1.1 billion Br from the 227,398
visitors that came to Ethiopia in 2005. The
following year’s number increased by 28pc reaching
290,458 while revenue jumped by 14pc to 1.3 billion
Br. If the country meets the National Secretariat’s
estimation of attracting 300,000 peoples, it will
hugely contribute for the increasing of visitor’s
number in 2007.
STILL HOPEFUL
But local business owners are not going to be taken
so easily by more predictions this time.
“If they are not coming at the beginning of the
celebration, I do not think the Diasporas will come
as we expected after this,” Henok said.
Despite bleak results, Tsegaye believes that the
National Secretariat’s plan to celebrate the
Millennium throughout the year and coining it the
“African Millennium” is a good marketing idea.
“These types of ideas will pay dividends in the long
run,” he said. “They are doing a long investment.”
According to Tsegaye, the dividend will begin to
show during the coming AU Summit in January 2008.
His Hotel, established in 1995 with 63 rooms, is
fully booked for the event. Currently, he said, as
the last three years seen in the hotel industry,
80pc of his rooms are occupied.
Returning back home a year ago and opening his own
restaurant, 2000 Habesha Restaurant, located
adjacent to Sidama Lodge, Negasi also dreamed about
the future.
However, things did not seem rosy for Demes. To
return what he borrowed from the bank and being out
of trouble, he decided to sell his two new cars.
Some of the buyers already approached him but their
offer disappointed them. He bought the cars for
115,000 Br each and the highest offer he received is
90,000 Br. He said that he will stay until he finds
a buyer who can pay as much as he spent.
Now things seem better. He has almost finalised his
negotiation to sell one of the two cars. When asked
about his next plan, he did not take seconds to
think about it.
“Once I will sell them, I will change the business,”
Demes said.
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