By Yunus S Saliu
The Board of Directors of Tourism for All The Gambia Charter (TAG) has on Friday, 8th September 2023 awarded seven scholarships to qualified members of the Gambia Hotels Association (GHA) to pursue an Associate Bachelor degree in Hotel Management with the St Clement University (Switzerland Campus).
The award of the scholarships ceremony held at the BakadajiHotel was witnessed by the officials of the Gambia Tourism Board (GTBoard), Gambia Tourism and Hospitality Institute (GTHI), Tourism Diversification and Resilient Project, NgalaLodge, GHA, Djeliba Leisure Group, Kairaba Beach Hotel, Baobab Hotel, Accessible Tourism, TAG and as well as the host, Bakadaji Hotel.
Recipients of the scholarships included Sahara Fye – DjelibaLeisure Group, Fatou Ndow – Ngala Lodge, Hali Njie – Gambia Tourism Board, Aminatta Senghore, Kairaba Beach Hotel, Karamo Jammeh, Gambia Tourism and Hospitality Institute, Omar Buwaro – Baobab Hotel and Ismaila Bah – Accessible Tourism.
Dr. Yahaya Muhammd Bah, Executive Director and Founder of Tourism for All Gambia Charter in his keynote address gave a brief background of the charter saying it was founded in 2006 to promote an inclusive tourist industry in which all infrastructure, products, and services are effortlessly accessible to all tourists including tourist with disabilities for a nostalgic memorable holiday.
He disclosed that tourists of today are not only content with staying within the confines of hotels, being bused to sites and entertained in places that mainly cater to Tourists; but are increasingly interested in experiencing the diversity of the holiday environment in all its aspects, including its people, culture, architecture, nature and way of life.
He emphasized that being in a wheelchair, visually impaired and so on should not prevent you from enjoying what a destination is offering. He noted that there are many studies about the economic return of promoting and ensuring tourism for all exists in a destination.
In a quest towards the realization of the economic return of promoting and ensuring tourism for all exists in the destination, he said he did a project on the economic return of a non-handicap in built environment conducted in Stockholm with the help of the EU.
About the St Clement University based in Switzerland, Dr. Bah explained that the university is a partner to the Tourism for All the Gambia (TAG), and “we have been enjoying quite a numbers of support from them. This year they gave us scholarships to award to hotels and key partners. It is a full scholarship online and it is for Bachelor’s Degree. There are some nominated applicants for the scholarships while the most successful that met the criteria were selected.”
The Executive Director quickly advised the awardees to put their efforts towards the course and prove themselves worthy to allow more in the future.
Mr Sajal Sambou, human resource director for the GTBoardrepresented the Director General of the GTBoard thanked TAG for the gesture and for helping the institutions and other stakeholders to develop the capacity of the workforce in this industry, while looking forward to more collaboration in the future.
Mr Francis Njie, Chairman of the Gambia Hotel Association (GHA) thanked the TAG for the initiative and reassured them of having all accommodations be all-inclusive tourism while he thanked Madam Marion Niang for the successful coordination of the award ceremony.
Through the Founder and Executive Director of TAG, the GHA chairman thanked, St Clement University (Switzerland Campus) for awarding the scholarships to the deserving employees of the Gambia Hospitality Sector. “Be assured that the knowledge gained from this course will add value to the recipients and the tourism sector as a whole while I look forward to the awardees’ successful completion of this course of study, I thereby urge you to become a beacon of hope to your colleagues and those to follow.”
