IN THE immediate aftermath of the Sharm el-Sheikh tragedy that saw seven Cypriots killed in a minibus crash, both the Foreign Ministry and the Cyprus Tourism Organisation came out with warnings to Cypriots travelling overseas to stick to their organised group excursions and not arrange any outings with non-approved local operators.
While the shock of a second tragedy involving Cypriots in the week of the Helios air disaster is understandable, such a knee-jerk reaction was irresponsible coming from senior state officials.
One would expect tour operators to warn their customers that any excursions outside those provided by the group were at their own risk. They are protecting their own interests, and there are issues of legal liability and insurance in such organised tours. But coming from the Foreign Ministry, the warnings almost sounded like a formal travel advisory, even though reports were still sketchy and details of the accident only just coming in. With the public understandably jittery after the Helios tragedy, it merely reinforced our general sense of nervousness and uncertainty.
After all, many Cypriots have only recently and tentatively begun to discover the joys of foreign holidays. In a week when many will have felt uncomfortable about the whole idea of overseas travel, it is easy to read into such words a message to hunker down and stay at home.
This is not what we need to hear from our government. We want leadership and reassurance, not a nanny state warning to stay carefully in line when we go into the great unknown of foreign lands.
After all, as many people die on our roads every year as did in the Helios air crash last Sunday, let alone the Egyptian minibus accident. Does the government advise us only to travel on approved vehicles in Cyprus? Of course it doesn’t.
Tourists are also killed in those accidents. So how would we feel if the British Foreign Office was to warn British tourists travelling to Cyprus not to hire mopeds or cars, and not to go on any excursions other than those provided by their British tour operator?
And what if foreign governments warned their nationals not to travel on Cypriot planes in the wake of the Helios air crash because there were question marks over their maintenance and safety records? We would, quite rightly, be furious, accusing them of tarring everyone with the same brush and jumping the gun in rushing to judgement before the outcome of the investigation.
And just one detail: many of those who died on board the Helios plane were travelling in organised groups with reputable tour operators. It didn’t save their lives.
