Katara Hospitality is exploring various investment opportunities in South Africa, including a possible acquisition of hotels and resorts, among others, South African ambassador Faizal Mooza has said.
“They’ve just been into my country two weeks ago to go and assess and do a due diligence on a number of opportunities and I’m sure shortly they will make a decision on that. There is already in the pipeline,” the envoy told reporters recently. 
He was speaking on the sidelines of a travel workshop organised by Qatar Airways and South African Tourism Board, in conjunction with the South African embassy in Doha, held at the Doha Exhibition and Convention Centre on September 19.
The event was attended by Martha Paulos, vice-president of Doha Sales for Qatar Airways, South African Tourism Board Middle East deputy director Sadiq Dindar and Mooza, along with other guests.
“In fact, Katara Hospitality has really taken a positive view of the continent and of course, South Africa being the biggest tourism hub on the continent, they will surely be there,” Mooza said.
Katara Hospitality is a global hotel owner, developer and operator with a collection of iconic hotels in key markets across Europe, Africa, Asia and the US.
The envoy added that “the Qatar National Tourism Council (QNTC) is also very keen on how we can create synergy between Qatar and South Africa on the tourism side.”
“Now that my government is on board we‘re going to engage directly and in fact we had a couple of meetings with QNTC,” he said.
“They are also very interested in the management of our national parks from an environmental point of view,” Mooza said. “So there is going to be that kind of synergy between Qatar and South Africa to transfer knowledge for instance and they are looking at us because we have a lot of (expertise on this).”
He also expects more visitors from Doha to visit South Africa after recently granting visa exemption to Qatari passport holders. 
The envoy cited a 30% increase in the number of tourists coming from Qatar in the first quarter of this year compared to the previous year during the same period.
“We saw a healthy increase and there was (also) a big increase including the second quarter. There is a lot of interest,” he noted, adding that a lot of Qataris also see South Africa as a business destination.
The embassy also made it easier for Indian nationals to travel to South Africa via an online visa application, according to Mooza.
 “We do realised that there are a lot of Indians in Qatar go to South Africa as well because it is a good destination for vacation and for business,” he said.
“I’ve been very active in getting the visa for Qataris, and I looked at the demographics of Qatar and therefore the Indian (ease in securing a visa) makes a lot of sense, they have a big population (in Qatar), and occupy senior positions, have disposable income, and they do travel,” the envoy pointed out.
Mooza is also trying to push for the easing of visa requirements for Filipinos saying they also have a huge population in Qatar.
“And a lot of times when Qataris travel, they are taking a number of Filipinos with them, and there are still visa requirements for Filipinos so that is my next phase of getting my minister to relook at those kinds of things,” he said.
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