The Nicolás Maduro regime reported that Falcón was the state with the highest number of visitors during the 2023 Easter holiday season. However, the numbers provided by service providers say otherwise.
By Correspondent lapatilla.com
Through a national channel, Vice President Delcy Rodríguez affirmed that the Falcón State received 1,141,330 visitors with the majority of them concentrated in the Morrocoy National Park, where 209,391 people enjoyed its beaches. With much fanfare, the Chavista official assured that an hotel occupancy rate of 95% was achieved.
According to the Falcón Chamber of Tourism, the service providers never came close to the expectations that were raised for the season. Furthermore, those who offered accommodations only reported 40% hotel occupancy.
According to the data collected by the Falcón Chamber of Tourism, “Full Days” packages predominated. These were offered by different companies to promote visits to the region, especially during low occupancy seasons.
Richard Zambrano, representing the chamber, explained that there was some influx of visitors in several places in the state, specifically on the eastern coast, where there was a significant mobilization of visitors, but they did not stay overnight. Therefore, it cannot be categorized as tourists but hikers, a situation that is contrary to what was experienced on the island of Margarita or Los Roques.
Utilities run to the ground
The low flow of visitors was also observed in Paraguaná, the North Center, the Sierra and the West of the entity, where hotel occupations did not meet the expectations of those who work in this sector. A major factor was the deficiencies in public services. For example, in the Sierra de Falcón the roads are destroyed and communication is almost non-existent through the different cell phone operators, a region where long-term blackouts are frequent.
The Paraguaná Peninsula does not escape this situation. Despite the improvements that Adícora has received, electrical failures persist, affecting the use of points of sale and electronic transactions, forcing service providers to only receive cash payments and, in many cases, sales are lost.
“We want to highlight that the people who came to the state felt satisfied with the service provided by the providers, despite having these weaknesses in basic services,” said Zambrano, while recalling that the businessmen did not have access either. to subsidized diesel to turn on power plants in the event of blackouts, which also limited the accommodation service.
Regarding this assessment, they will hold a meeting with all the service providers in Falcón to draw up strategies to improve occupations in high seasons and talk about low seasons, which are of great concern.
“We had a significant volume of visitors, but tourist spending is not reflected as in other states, since lodging spending is a benefit for local communities,” he concluded.
A normal day
Francisco Melián, president of the Chamber of Commerce of Paraguaná (Cacoinpar), said that in Punto Fijo, which is the main city of Paraguaná, for years enjoyed a lot of visitors to the Free Zone, but at Easter there was no increase in sales. Everything went normally, like any other day.
On the other hand, in the coastal areas, sales improved a little compared to the low seasons, thanks to the visit of vacationers.
The mayor of the Falcón Municipality, Harold Guerrero, the jurisdiction where the entire coastal axis of Paraguaná is developed and the most visited beaches are located, explained that it presents serious electrical and drinking water service failures that not only affect tourism, but mainly the inhabitants of the nine parishes that make up the Municipality.
The Falcón municipality is the largest in Paraguaná. There they spend up to days without electricity, without connectivity, and drinking water is almost non-existent. The municipal president requests that state companies strive to resolve the situation within the jurisdiction, where people are greatly affected by the deficiencies of these basic services.
“These two services are combined: if one fails, the other also fails. When it’s time to pump water for the municipality and the electricity goes out, the service is immediately interrupted. Here in this municipality we have scheduled cuts that keep us from advancing and developing economically. What our beloved municipality is experiencing is truly a calamity (…) We have to establish the rules of the game. For my part, I am willing to collaborate and join efforts to minimize this problem that has the residents of our municipality living in a very poor way,” lamented the mayor.