Royal order pushes Salalah into development mode

Mon, 14 January 2013

By Kaushalendra Singh — SALALAH — The Ministry of Tourism held a crucial meeting yesterday with all the stakeholders of development in Dhofar and discussed the issue of raising efficiency and improving services during the Khareef season. The meeting assumed significance in the wake of Royal Orders that allocated RO 15 million for the development of tourist sites in the Governorate of Dhofar.
The meeting primarily discussed proper utilisation of RO 15 million granted by His Majesty the Sultan and thus making Salalah a comfortable tourist spot with raised facilities in terms of roads, restaurants, accommodation and entertainment. The meeting was held at Crowne Plaza Salalah under the auspices of Ahmed bin Nasser al Mehrzi, Tourism Minister. Present during the discussion were Shaikh Abdullah bin Saif al Mahrouqi, Deputy Governor of Dhofar; Maitha al Mahrooqi, Under-Secretary Ministry of Tourism; Khalid Musallam al Rawas, Director-General of Tourism in Dhofar; and officials from the Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Royal Oman Police and Ministry of Tourism.
The Tourism Minister briefed the media after the meeting and said that the ministry was exploring all the possibilities to ensure the best possible facilities to the tourists who love to visit Salalah during the Khareef season. The steps, according to him, would take all possible measures to avoid the problems faced by the tourists during the Khareef season last year.
“This time around (during the coming Khareef) the facilities would start greeting the visitors as soon as they enter into gate Salalah. There would be much more restaurants and places to take rest during the journey to Salalah,” he said. The minister said the meeting discussed all the projects to be implemented in the coming months, “as we have limited time to complete them”.
He laid emphasis on the fact that with these projects the visitors and tourists would have choice to choose the facilities ranging from restaurants to rest rooms and houses on rent. The Tourism Under-Secretary said the meeting assessed all the possibilities to offer services to the visitors during the Khareef season. “We have already done studies and have identified projects on short term and long term. The projects would be completed as per the requirements of the visitors,” said Maitha al Mahrooqi.
“We had depth discussion over all the projects and the coming months would see fast implementation of short term projects to meet the Khareef 2013 deadline,” she said.

I'm not sure, but it seems that the Royal Order has some clout with regards to getting things done, maybe with our project also.