Hotelplan, Thomas Cook to start European charter flights to Gan

Hotelplan and Thomas Cook on Monday announced that it will start charter flights from Europe to Gan island in Addu atoll in December this year.

In a meeting held by the Maldives Tourism Development Cooperation (MTDC), the two companies said that they were committed to making the MTDC's resort Herethere in Maldives southernmost atoll a success.

Hotel Plan said that charter flights will travel on the route Milan (Italy), Male and Gan (Maldives) on Blue Panorama Airlines.

Thomas Cook also announced that in November flights will be started from Germany's Frankfurt to Gan on Condor airlines.

The two tour operators said that resorts for middle income tourists were important for the Maldives tourism industry, and that should the government open more resorts in the southern region for middle class travellers, they can fly direct from Europe to Gan, without involving Male' or any other transit point.

Tour operators have hailed development of tourism in Addu which they say will be a "unique" Maldives experience; the beaches are "different" and tourists can get a first hand experience of local culture from Maldives' second most populous atoll, they say.

Mohamed Umar Maniku, chairman of Universal Enterprises and also the powerful industrial private lobby group Maldives Association of Tourism Industry (MATI), and who also acts as advisor to MTDC, told the meeting that he cannot say anything on the development of Vilingili, a joint venture between the Maldives government and Shangri-La, which has taken several years to go into development.

"However, I will assure you that we will make Herethere a reality," he said.

MTDC's chairman, "Champa" Hussein Afeef who also has his own resort company Crown Tours, said that it took about six months to convince tour operators that Addu atoll was a viable tourist destination.

"Now about 40 tour operators have expressed interest in buying beds from Herethere," he said.

He said that he was sure that local tour operators can also charter flights to Addu but said that he first approached foreign tour operators to make sure that everything will go smoothly.

Afeef said that 50 percent of construction work on Herethere has been completed and that the resort will open in November.

Addu, which has always been at loggerheads with the central government in Male, has been one of the most neglected atolls in the archipelago, resulting in people electing opposition MPs to parliament.

The decaying atoll's revival has always been hindered because according to critics, the central government has never recovered and forgiven the people of Addu for the attempted secession during former President Ibrahim Nasir's term.

Source:- HNS