Western Cape Premier Ebrahim Rasool has flown in the face of a national marketing campaign for the 2010 Fifa World Cup by declaring that ”Cape Town must be the face of 2010” and that the city is the ”country’s strongest brand”.
Rasool also said the province had to be the base for 2010 tourists, ”with people flying out to Gauteng for a match and then back again”.
His comments were made in the context of the Three Years to Go Conference in Cape Town this week, which focused on the province’s role.
CEO of the International Marketing Council (IMC), Yvonne Johnston, implicitly contradicted Rasool by insisting South Africa had to be branded as a country. The IMC is working on marketing alignment, particularly among host cities, so that campaigns for different regions have a ”common look and feel”. She could not comment on the Western Cape’s branding campaign.
The city of Johannesburg’s director of communications, Gabu Tugwana, dismissed Rasool’s remarks as ”laughable”. ”People will choose where they want to stay. Who in their right mind would fly to Jo’burg, as the host city for a big match, and then fly out again? The cup is about South Africa and Africa, not just Cape Town.”
The theme was echoed by deputy head of the strategic projects team for the eThekwini Municipality, Sue Bannister, who said Durban was ”definitely” not adopting Rasool’s approach. ”One of our key aims is to expose a broad segment of the international community to Africa and South Africa. We need to use the World Cup to expose tourists to new destinations.”
Rasool contrasted last year’s ”commuter cup” in Germany with 2010, a ”residential” tournament. This brings new benefits, ”especially when you get to the knock-out stages and there are days between matches”.
Cape Town Tourism’s Mariette du Toit-Helmbold said more than 26 000 visitors could be comfortably accommodated close to the central city. The city has added 1 100 new hotel rooms in the past five years and a further nine hotels will be developed in the next five, bringing a 45% growth in capacity. The aim is to accommodate 50 000 visitors a day.