World Travel News

Tourists have sexually exploited more than 10,000 girls in the Coast Province, a workshop was told yesterday.

Chief children’s officer Maurice Tsuma termed the national figure of between 10,000 and 30,000 girls engaging in sex tourism “an under-estimation".

Mr Tsuma made the remarks at the Whitesands Hotel, Mombasa, where he opened a two-day Unicef workshop on the code of conduct to protect children from sex tourism.

He said sexual exploitation of children was rampant in Mombasa, Malindi and Kilifi.

Tsuma said criminals organised the trafficking of upcountry girls for prostitution in tourist resorts at the Coast.

“There is trafficking of girls from upcountry to practise prostitution in the tourist towns,” he said.

Tsuma, who has worked as district children’s officer in Mombasa and Malindi, said the culprits were foreign and domestic tourists.

The United States has hinted strongly that it will join Britain in banning Transport Minister Chris Murungaru from travelling to America.

The US embassy in Nairobi says any Visa application filed by Murungaru wil be subjected to a review under rules allowing Washington to deny him such entry.

The AFP news agency however says US embassy officials have refused to say if Murungaru has applied for a visa.

Last week’s decision by Britain’s to cancel Murungaru’s visa prompted a furious response from the minister who threatened to sue the British government for assaulting his reputation.

He blames his troubles on a vendetta against him by former British High Commissioner Edward Clay.

More: capitalfm.co.ke

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have been caught enjoying a second romantic African getaway in as many weeks after checking into a Moroccan hotel last weekend.

The couple were snapped together with the actress’ adopted son Maddox on a beach in Kenya on April 19, and now they’ve been spotted at Morocco’s Amanjena Hotel, where they spent 24 hours alone in their room, according to US tabloid National Enquirer.

Airport worker Muhammad Dhabi, who saw the couple arrive by private jet at an airfield near Marrakech, tells the tabloid: “They got off the plane separately as though they were ashamed. You could see they are a couple in love.”

A new forecast by the World Tourism and Travel Council (WTTC) shows that total economic activity in travel and tourism in Kenya generated Sh176.1 billion last year.

The 2004 Travel and Tourism Economic Research commissioned by WTTC say the growth is expected to hit Sh455 billion by 2014.

“Travel and Tourism demand is expected to grow by 4.7 per cent per annum in real terms, between 2004 and 2014,” says the report.

Jean-Claude Baumgarten WTTC President and the council’s chairman, Vincent Wolfington, endorsed the authoritative report.

“When all statistics and receipts are finally compiled, it is expected that the sector directly created 226,235 jobs or 4.1 per cent of employment last year.”

According to the forecast done by Oxford Econometrics Forecasting (OEF), Travel and Tourism last year contributed Sh58 billion equivalent to 5.1 per cent of the Gross Domestic product (GDP).