The hangover of tourists, especially locals, around Kenya during the Christmas and New Year holidays has not yet been sobered up, and the hotelier and restaurateur categories are hoping that the season is not already over.
Tourism-related activities hope that there will still be room for "latecomers", i.e. those who, rather than using the "slots" of the vacations, prefer to take advantage of the special offers of January and February, long weekends and black weeks (in the opposite sense of "white week", of course).
Joking aside, the association of Bars, Hotels and sellers of alcoholic beverages BAHLITA is very worried because it fears the opposite effect, that is, tourists in this period have used up their resources to have fun and soon they will return to their occupations (for those who have one, a fixed occupation) and will tighten their belts.
If it all ends here until Easter, according to BAHLITA it will take at least 11 years to return to pre-Covid-19 levels and recover some of the losses, which equate to at least 150 billion shillings for the entire industry.
The association's secretary general, Boniface Gachola, admitted that most businesses are struggling to pay debts incurred during the harsh lockdown and curfew period and that the Christmas rush has only covered a fraction of the impasse.
"The losses we've incurred to date cannot be made up in one or two seasons. It will take longer," Gachoka told national newspaper The Star. "The holiday season has helped restore operations, including the reinstatement of many employees, as well as rent arrears and vendor payments. Most businesses, however, are still operating at a loss."
Without a long wave of attendance, there is a risk of having to send home some who have been on layoffs without even receiving social security benefits from the government, which has, however, initiated paperwork for subsidized loans, although the program has not yet been made operational.
According to industry statistics, more than 250,000 jobs were lost during the period of the pandemic and few of these have been recovered in the long term, not least because as many as 15,000 businesses have not reopened since the lockdown and curfew hit.
And it's not just hospitality: data from the government in collaboration with the Kenya Private Sector Alliance indicates that the entire tourism industry has been the hardest hit with 3.1 million jobs eaten up by the pandemic.
This, in addition to hotel, pub and restaurant employees, includes tour operators, airlines, travel agents and their related suppliers and support services. Some 2.3 million employees were sent home on unpaid leave, with most hotel staff paid 50 percent as businesses' earnings were minimized, if not nil.