Sisi says lights will not go out in Sharm El Sheikh

SHARM EL SHEIKH — Egypt's president declared on Wednesday that the “lights will not be going out in Sharm El Sheikh”, as he visited the Red Sea resort hit by suspension of foreign flights since a Russian airliner crash some experts suspect was caused by a bomb.

President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi said his visit was a message of support for investors and businesses in Sharm El Sheikh and Egypt's other main Red Sea resort of Hurghada. But as he spoke, dozens protested outside one nearby hotel over lay-offs.

Egypt said it stood to lose $280 million a month from the halt in Russian and British flights to Sharm El Sheikh, the two countries accounting for two thirds of foreign visitors to the beach and diving holiday destination.

Thousands of Russian and British tourists have already left, and several other European countries also suspended flights following the October 31 crash which killed all 224 people onboard. 

The plane broke up at high altitude and some national authorities have said it may have been hit by a bomb explosion.

"The lights will not be going out in Sharm El Sheikh or Hurghada while we are here," Sisi told reporters. "We will support them in facing the situation we are in."

His words, however, were little comfort to dozens of laid-off workers protesting outside Sharm El Sheikh's Rosetta Hotel.

"Sisi is all talk and no delivery," said Sayed Megahed, who heads the association of shop and bazar renters in the resort. "The very moment Sisi was at the airport, hotel managers were getting rid of staff."

“There is a disaster in tourism and the first thing investors do is clamp down on the little guy, the workers.”

Egypt’s tourism revenue is a vital source of foreign currency in a country, which has seen its foreign cash reserves dwindle sharply during years of political instability, following the 2011 uprising which overthrew Hosni Mubarak.

Last year, nearly 10 million tourists visited, far less than the 14.7 million in 2010. Officials had hoped for modest growth this year but the Sinai plane crash, coming at the start of the peak Red Sea winter holiday season, is likely to reverse that.

Daesh

Sinai Province, an affiliate of the Daesh terror group, says it brought down the plane. It has been waging an insurgency in Sinai, but had so far focused its battle against security forces in the north of the peninsula, hundreds of kilometres from Sharm El Sheikh on its southern tip.

Alarmed at the potential scale of losses, Egyptian officials have expressed frustration with Western governments for suggesting the Russian Airbus A321 had been targeted by Sinai-based militants before crash investigators reach their findings.

“So far there is no proof of anything,” Sisi said.

A senior Russian official said that Moscow’s decision to suspend flights was unlikely to be reversed soon.

“It’s for a long time. For how long — I cannot really say, but I think that for several months, minimum,” Sergei Ivanov, the head of the presidential administration, was quoted as saying by RIA news agency on Tuesday.

Tourism Minister Hesham Zaazou said he would seek to make up for the loss of international business by encouraging domestic tourism, as well as encouraging Gulf Arab visitors and easing visa requirements for tourists from North Africa.

He said he planned a $5 million public relations campaign to promote Egypt in Britain and Russia and win back tourism from those countries.

Sisi echoed that message during his visit.

“Egypt is secure, stable and safe and welcomes your people,” he said. “They will come to Egypt peacefully and leave peacefully and we will do all we can to protect and look after them”.