Tourism suffers decline due to B'Haram insurgency

In 2014, Cameroon’s tourism finished with a decline in performance compared to 2013. These were the sentiments expressed by Tourism Ministry officials in Extreme-North which is home to most of the country’s touristic sites.

Indeed, in this region of Cameroon, which is prone to constant attacks involving expatriate kidnappings attributed to members of the Nigerian Islamist sect, Boko Haram, hotel occupancy received a major blow.

According to authorised sources, various reports conclude that the ministry witnessed a drastic fall “in the occupancy levels of some hotels, indicating a decline from 90% to 30%.”

With the threat of Boko Haram, several Western consulates and embassies have declared the Extreme-North region unsafe for their nationals, hence the goal announced by Philémon Yang, to welcome 2 million tourists in 2015 seems farfetched.