Real People, Gossip and gists; 85% of Religious Sites Mentioned in the Old Testament Are in Jordan’

During a recent tour of Jordan by a select group of Nigerian journalists and media personnel to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, the Managing Director of the Jordan Tourism Board, Abed Al Razzaq Arabiyat, took time out to answer questions on a wide range of issues. Demola Ojo presents excerpts…

What makes Jordan special?

I’m sure you will be surprised about the products we have regarding the historical and cultural sites in Jordan. 85 per cent of the religious sites mentioned in the Old Testament are in Jordan. This is something maybe a lot of people did not know that Jordan is the Holy Land. We have 34 sites in Jordan linked with Jesus. You can feel the origins of Christianity in Jordan.

In addition to religious tourism, we also have history and culture, adventure tourism, eco-tourism and medical tourism as well. Jordan is blessed with a diversity of products that can cater to all the needs and preferences of the tourist.

What are the peculiar features that make a visit to the Baptismal site a purely Jordanian experience as opposed to visiting the Jordan River from the banks of Israel? Can either country truly claim to host the exact spot where Jesus was baptized?

It has been approved from the Vatican that the Baptism site is in Jordan. Every year, the Vatican arranges for church leaders to go to this place. The Pope will be visiting Jordan in May. One of the four sites he will visit is the Baptism site.

We have seven churches of different denominations built at the site. This is clear indication of the importance of this site.

Why has it taken so long for Jordan to emphasize the presence of so many religious sites within its borders?

I agree that we used to focus more on the other experiences that we have. We used to promote Jordan as a destination rich in culture and with beautiful beaches especially for the Europeans.

Now we have changed the strategy to focus more on the religious. We have prepared a new brochure for the sites that were mentioned in the bible including the story behind each site. This and more are the efforts we have made to promote Jordan as a biblical destination.

We decided to focus on this experience since we strongly believe that religious tourism, especially for Christians is important for Jordan. We invite a lot of church leaders to educate them and let them be aware of what we have.

What are you doing as a tourism board to ease the process of entry into Jordan?

We work together with the Nigerian ambassador here as well as the ministry of interior and the ministry of tourism to facilitate the process of visa and we succeeded to minimize the duration of obtaining a visa from 30 days to 15 days.

We are working more with the government and the parliament on the possibility of visa on arrival because we believe that the Nigerian market is very important to Jordan. We have a direct flight to Lagos through Royal Jordanian; we have the infrastructure and we have this opportunity to work more to facilitate this.

I can tell you that the government fully understands the potential of this market (Nigeria) and in maybe two months, we will see another change to facilitate the entry of the Nigerian tourist.

Considering the fact that Jordan is surrounded by troubled countries, do you think promoting Jordan is coming at the right time?

On the contrary, we proved that we (Jordan) are safe because of the wisdom of our leadership and the high education of our people. We proved that Jordan will remain the oasis of peace as usual. People are looking to Jordan as a destination of choice because of what is happening around us. The people searching for safety come to Jordan and all the international media are broadcasting from Jordan. This is an indication that Jordan is safe, that’s why they are based here in Jordan.

Frankly speaking, there may be misperceptions of the country and the problems around us affect the tourism in Jordan because people may not be aware; they just group Jordan with these countries but when you come and see by yourself and live the experience, and convey this message via your media, definitely, this will help us a lot.

If you’re promoting religious tourism, have you thought of using people with a deep understanding of the religion (Christianity) as tour guides – someone who can for example, quote from the scriptures - rather than generic tour guides who are knowledgeable?

We are in the process of educating the tour guides to talk the language of the bible and Christianity. On the other hand we are cooperating with the Jordanian church leaders to be tour guides so they can talk from a religious background. It is very important to communicate the message, to be clear to your guests.

We will also cooperate with the embassies here in Jordan to educate and to provide specialized guides and tour leaders and definitely this will add credibility to the product that we have.

When are you coming to Nigeria to market and what will your strategy be?

We are thinking of launching a marketing campaign in the Nigerian market focusing on religion and we will have a roadshow with the Jordanian tour operators coming with us (JTB) to meet their counterparts in Nigeria for networking, exchange programs and agreements.

We will continue with e-marketing activities and identify the most important specialized websites in Nigeria and introduce Jordan as a destination for religious tourism.

How many tourists visit Jordan and what is their profile?

We have 3.8 overnight visitors to Jordan (annually). Half of them are from GCC countries (Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE), the rest are mainly from Europe. The African market is new for us. It’s in our strategy to introduce Jordan there with aggressive marketing campaigns, because everybody is competing to bring tourists from Europe.

The statistics published by the UNWTO and other institutes tell us that you have to go for the new emerging markets; Africa and the Far East. We built our strategy based on this information, to go for these emerging markets.