Cape Town was a hive of activity yesterday, as President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle, as well as their daughters, visited Cape Town for the day on their three African nation tour. It also was the opening of the Nelson Mandela Legacy Exhibition, an emotionally moving event. The day was focused on the contribution which former President Mandela has made to Cape Town in particular, but also to South Africa and the rest of the world. Continue reading →
Tag Archives: constitution
New Cape Town Tourism Chairman Sabine Lehmann to focus on new City of Cape Town marketing relationship!
As we predicted, the new Chairman of Cape Town Tourism is its previous Deputy Chairman and the Managing Director of the Table Mountain Aerial Cableway Company, Sabine Lehmann, the first female Chairman of the tourism body, and elected at the first meeting of the new Cape Town Tourism Board two weeks ago, said an e-mail sent to Cape Town Tourism members last week.
Ms Lehmann will not have an easy task to negotiate with tough City of Cape Town funder Anton Groenewald, the Director of the new City of Cape Town Tourism, Events and Marketing (TEAM) Directorate, who showed his muscle eight years ago, when he brought the previous Cape Town Tourism and its Board (with CEO Sheryl Ozinsky) on its knees, by withholding funding when we as a Board attempted resisting amalgamation with all the other tourism bodies in Cape Town, and closing down the original Section 21 company (which still has not been wound down!).
At the AGM of Cape Town Tourism last month, Mr Groenewald announced that his Directorate will take away Destination Marketing from Cape Town Tourism, which will be left with Visitor Services and Tourism Marketing only, seen by most in the industry as well as journalists as a vote of no confidence in the marketing, or lack of, of Cape Town. Its future marketing role will be restricted to representing Cape Town at international exhibitions (such as World Travel Market in London, where CEO Mariette du Toit-Helmbold is representing Cape Town with Wesgro at the moment), hosting local and international media, and digital marketing. The City of Cape Town has appointed Rory Viljoen as its new Director of Place Marketing (or Destination Marketing).
In the Cape Town Tourism member e-mail Mrs Helmbold tried to sound upbeat towards her members, and made the right noises towards the City of Cape Town and its future relationship: “…the Cape Town Tourism Executive team and Board are optimistic about working with the City on a new destination marketing model for Cape Town”. She referred to the Constitution of Cape Town Tourism, writing that the tourism body ‘will continue to deliver tourism marketing and visitor services in line with our Constitution’. However, the City’s removal of Cape Town Tourism’s Destination Marketing role is in breach of Cape Town Tourism’s Constitution, an issue which she does not address. A new three year contract is to be negotiated with the City of Cape Town as a first priority, to provide greater financial and operational stability for Cape Town Tourism, as the contracts have been renewed annually in the past. Ms Lehmann will have to live with the Service Level Agreement which appears to have been hastily signed by outgoing Cape Town Tourism Chairman Ian Bartes before the AGM, and possibly without approval from the rest of the Board members.
The rest of the two page e-mail is a badly written copy and paste job of a recent media release, as well as of Mrs Helmbold’s speech at the AGM, with unacceptable grammatical errors and Mrs Helmbold’s love for nonsensical phrases: “We’ve had to make difficult decisions in the past, and we will do so again to ensure that Cape Town Tourism is a well-run organisation that contributes in a real way to positioning Cape Town as one of the world’s leading tourism destinations. As always, we will take the industry along on our journey and ensure that our strategies and plans are co-crafted with the industry and the stakeholders who are the flesh and blood of the tourism sector in Cape Town. Changes in our environment, whether local or international, brings (sic) with it the opportunity to go back to basics, re-imagine the future and ensure that we stay relevant”.
The e-mail to the Cape Town Tourism members does not explain to its members what exactly its future role will be, and what impact this will have on the staffing of Cape Town Tourism (some retrenchments were hinted at at the AGM) and on the service delivery to its members. Surprising is that Mrs Helmbold does not know the correct company name of her new Chairman!
Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage
Cape Town Tourism reassures its members about Marketing role, causes further confusion!
In order to reassure its members about its future role, Cape Town Tourism issued a media statement late yesterday afternoon, the content of which will make the tourism industry even more confused.
At the AGM of Cape Town Tourism on Thursday, preceded by an e-mail sent to members the day before, it was announced that the City of Cape Town is taking over Cape Town Tourism’s role of Destination Marketing, and that the tourism organisation would focus in future on Visitor Services and on Tourism Marketing, even though it was not clear what the difference is between Tourism Marketing and Destination Marketing.
The media statement says that Cape Town Tourism as an ‘organisation will remain a dynamic industry organisation delivering tourism destination marketing and visitor services in line with its Constitution’. On Monday we wrote that taking away the Destination Marketing function of Cape Town Tourism is in breach of Cape Town Tourism’s Constitution.
While the City of Cape Town’s Executive Director of Tourism, Events, and Marketing (TEAM), Anton Groenewald, had been clear that Cape Town Tourism will only handle ‘Tourism Marketing’ with Visitor Services, Cape Town Tourism CEO Mariette du Toit-Helmbold is quoted in the Cape Town Tourism media statement as referring to ‘tourism destination marketing‘, a term not used by the City of Cape Town in its presentation at the AGM. Interesting too is the reference to the Constitution, which may make the City’s move, even if the ex-Cape Town Tourism Chairman Ian Bartes signed the Service Level Agreement with the City, agreeing to it shedding its role, unconstitutional in itself – we question whether the Constitution allows Bartes to sign such an agreement without Board approval, as intimated at the AGM.
Interesting is that Mrs Helmbold praises her own organisation, as if to plead to the City for a rethink: ‘Cape Town Tourism was the best vehicle to deliver tourism destination marketing and visitor services for Cape Town’, but it would appear that the City of Cape Town does not agree, a number of media reports agreeing with our interpretation that the events at the AGM were in fact a vote of no confidence in Cape Town Tourism’s ability to market Cape Town!
The media statement changes tack, and contradicts its earlier paragraph about its future role, and explains that Cape Town Tourism will perform a support role to the new Places Marketing division in the City’s new TEAM directorate, headed by Mr Groenewald: “The City of Cape Town introduced their new Tourism, Events and Marketing (incorporating Arts & Culture and Strategic Assets) Directorate to the industry at the Cape Town Tourism AGM. The function of the new directorate includes Place Marketing – a department that will, in future, take care of destination marketing at large for the city. Cape Town Tourism will focus on tourism marketing, whilst supporting the directorate with Place Marketing programmes”.
The media statement defines the future role of Cape Town Tourism as representing Cape Town at international exhibitions, hosting local and international media, digital marketing (i.e. lots more Tweeting!), and any further tourism marketing requirements of the City of Cape Town, for which it would have to pay extra!
History has shown that Cape Town Tourism cannot but accept the City’s directive, otherwise it will be bled dry by the City of Cape Town, as happened to the previous Cape Town Tourism section 21 company in 2004. Mrs Helmbold confirmed her organisation’s acceptance of the new directive: ” We are encouraged by the City’s commitment to conclude a three year visitor services and tourism marketing agreement with Cape Town Tourism before June 2013. We are committed to work with the City of Cape Town to co-design our future partnership with the City and agree on Cape Town Tourism’s role and responsibility within the broader Place Marketing agenda of the City. Tourism, the third largest contributor to the global economy, after the automobile and banking sectors, is a sector that really matters. As the world prepares to witness one billion arrivals by the end of 2012, we will never lose sight of the fact that tourism makes a significant contribution to shaping Cape Town’s future and a better life for its citizens. The partnership between tourism and local government must realise growth and opportunities for the tourism industry and those that work in and provide services to the sector.”
Mrs Helmbold also acknowledged that her organisation had not delivered on tourism growth, as we have pointed out on numerous occasions: “Cape Town Tourism is ready to work with the City on a new destination marketing model for Cape Town. We remain single-minded in our belief that we can help to turn the tide on shrinking demand and seasonality and will continue rolling out cutting edge visitor and tourism destination marketing programmes. Some elements will have to be delayed or reimagined in lieu of our reduced funding and ever changing trends. We will cut our cloth according to our available resources, but we will stay future-minded, never compromising innovation, creativity and excellence. We will improve the balance between “bricks and mortar” and digital visitor service delivery, and focus a lot more on marketing in partnership with the tourism industry and business at large.”
The rest of the long media statement was an encapsulation of information presented at the AGM, but did not explain the muddled definitions of ‘Destination Marketing‘ and ‘Tourism Marketing’, nor why Mrs Helmbold has given her organisation the new mandate of ‘tourism destination marketing’. One hopes that Cape Town Tourism and the City of Cape Town will clarify their exact roles and relationship, and will get on with the much-needed job of marketing Cape Town as a world class tourist destination!
Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage
Cape Town Tourism: Not much about AGM was constitutional! (second impressions)
The AGM of Cape Town Tourism was so bizarre, that it has taken some time to understand exactly what happened on Thursday evening at the Cape Town International Convention Centre. It appears that a number of aspects of the AGM are unconstitutional!
Having been a Board member and Deputy Chairman of the previous section 21 Cape Town Tourism until 2004, and having seen the power of the City of Cape Town in using its financial funding muscle to achieve what it wants, I went back to the Constitution of Cape Town Tourism, reading the version last updated after the AGM in 2011 (the resolution amending some typing errors in the Constitution, ‘approved’ on Thursday evening, has not yet been implemented). I discovered the following AGM procedures to be in breach of the Constitution of Cape Town Tourism:
1. Clause 8.1.2 states: “The notice convening the annual general meeting must state in broad terms the business to be transacted at the meeting and must specify the terms of any resolutions to be proposed”. The wording of the clause seems clumsy, but it would appear to mean that members should receive the resolutions when they receive the notice of the AGM. This was not the case, making the adoption of the Resolutions by show of hands at the meeting unconstitutional.
2. Even more odd was that no Annual Report was presented nor adopted at the meeting, the constitutional requirement (clause 8.1.5.2) being that ‘the presentation and adoption of the annual report of the Chairperson of Cape Town Tourism and the budget and business plan for the forthcoming year‘. As reported, outgoing Chairman Ian Bartes spent most of his talk focusing on the City of Cape Town’s changed Budget allocation of R36 million (from R42 million), and the removal of the Destination Marketing responsibility from Cape Town Tourism. He did mention that staff costs had reduced by 3%, and all other costs by 4% in the past financial year, and intimated that retrenchments may be on the cards, in answer to a question. No Business Plan was presented.
3. Similarly, in clause 8.1.5.3, ‘the consideration of the draft annual financial statements of Cape Town Tourism, as approved by the Board’ is specified in the Constitution, but no motion was moved to adopt the Financials!
4. The biggest shock of the AGM was the announcement that Cape Town Tourism is to lose its role of Destination Marketing, and has been left with only the duties of ‘Tourism Marketing’ and Visitor Information Services. Clause 5.1 of the Constitution defines the role of Cape Town Tourism as follows: ‘The main object of Cape Town Tourism is to provide destination marketing services and visitor services and thereby to provide services for the benefit of Cape Town Tourism members and the wider tourism industry’. ‘Destination Marketing’ is the role allocated to Cape Town Tourism, and there is no reference to a separate category of ‘Tourism Marketing’! In 2008 the members of Cape Town Tourism had voted to accept Cape Town Tourism’s expanded role of Destination Marketing, which had led to the appointment of a Marketing Manager (the current incumbent is Velma Corcoran).
The City’s decision to take ‘Destination Marketing’ away from Cape Town Tourism is therefore in breach of the Constitution of Cape Town Tourism. I challenged Mr Groenewald about this after the AGM, and he quickly responded that the resolutions presented at the AGM had taken care of this. There was no mention of a resolution relating to the changed role of Cape Town Tourism at the AGM. This is the record of the 2012 Resolutions on the Cape Town Tourism website:
“RESOLUTIONS TO BE TABLED AT THE ANNUAL GENERAL MEETING OF CAPE TOWN TOURISM (“CTT”) TO BE HELD AT THE CAPE TOWN INTERNATIONAL CONVENTION CENTRE ON 18 OCTOBER 2012
RESOLVED:
1. Finances
That, in terms of clause 15.2.1 of CTT’s Constitution (“the Constitution”), membership fees for the 2013/14 financial year be increased by 6.5% (six comma five percent).
2. Allowances
That, in terms of clause 16 of the Constitution, the following allowances and re-imbursements be paid to the members of the Board of CTT for the 2013/14 financial year:
2.1 Allowance: R400.00 per month;
2.2 Travel and parking: in accordance with CTT’s conditions of service for staff members.
3. Appointment of auditors
That, in terms of clause 15.5 of the Constitution, PKF be re-appointed as the auditors of CTT for the 2013/14 financial year.
4. Constitution
That the following amendments to the Constitution be approved, with effect from 18 October 2012:
4.1 By the deletion of clause 1.3 and its replacement by the following:
“In 2011 and in 2012 it was decided by the members of Cape Town Tourism to effect further
amendments to the Constitution. These amendments have been incorporated in a revised
Constitution, approved as provided for in clause 20 hereof.”
4.2 By the deletion in clause 5.2.2 of the words “Destination Marketing Organisation, known as Cape Town Routes Unlimited (“CTRU”)”, and their replacement by “Destination Marketing, Investment and Trade Promotion Agency for the Western Cape, known as WESGRO (“WESGRO”)”.
4.3 By the deletion in clause 8.1.5.7 of “far” and its replacement by “for”.
4.4 By the deletion in clause 8.2.2 of “Specify” and its replacement by “specify”.
4.5 By the deletion in clause 14.2 of “6 (five)” and its replacement by “5 (five)”. 4.6 That the designation at the end of the Constitution be deleted and replaced by the following:
“Thus adopted unanimously at a special general meeting of Cape Town Tourism held at the Ritz Hotel, Sea Point on 14 August 2008 and amended at the Annual General Meetings of Cape Town Tourism held at the Cape Town International Convention Centre on 17 October 2011 and 18 October 2012.”
it is clear that no Member approval was called for in regard to the future role of Cape Town Tourism, and that a Special General Meeting will have to be called, to make the removal of ‘Destination Marketing’ from Cape Town Tourism’s role constitutional.
Forcing members to vote for three of six ‘Black’ Board nominees, due to the constitutional requirement that three of its Board directors be ‘Black’, was a step backward in voting on the basis of skin colour and not on merit, in our opinion, but was in accordance with the Constitution.
Interesting to note is another clause (12.2), not related to the AGM, in which the Constitution states that ‘Only the Chief Executive Officer or the Chairperson or, in his/her absence, the Vice-Chairperson, are entitled to issue public statements on behalf of Cape Town Tourism’. Once again the wording is ambiguous (what does ‘issue’ entail?). We have noted that two recent media releases issued by Cape Town Tourism have quoted Councillor Grant Pascoe, in one instance combined with a quote from the CEO Mariette du Toit-Helmbold, and in another instance with no reference to her, which would appear to be unconstitutional. In hindsight, given the shock AGM announcement, it is clear that the City of Cape Town is now hijacking Cape Town Tourism’s PR activity (the little that there is) for its own glory! It would appear that quoting only Councillor Pascoe would make such media statements in breach of the Cape Town Tourism Constitution!
Something else that appeared odd was Chairman Bartes’ almost apologetic acknowledgement that he had signed the City of Cape Town’s amended Service Level Agreement, to prevent a ‘qualified audit’, and to ensure ‘stability’, both aspects unexplained. It sounded as if he had signed the Agreement without Board approval, which may be a breach of the Constitution, as no such power is vested in the Chairman as far as we can see.
The breaches of the Constitution of Cape Town Tourism in its handling of the AGM would appear to reflect an organisation that lost its focus when the City of Cape Town broke the news about its slashed Budget and its changed role in September, coincidentally the same time as the trip to Turkey, which 10-member delegation included Mr Groenewald from the City, and Cape Town Tourism Chairman Bartes, CEO Mrs Helmbold, and more. The breaches are unforgivable, and are a poor reflection on the Board of Cape Town Tourism, and its legal advisers!
Cape Town Tourism will have to call a Special General Meeting to fix its constitutional breaches, to:
1. Obtain approval of the Financial Statements (circulating them in advance to members)
2. Obtain approval of the Resolutions again (circulating them in advance)
3. Obtain approval of the Annual Report, with a Budget and Business Plan (circulating them in advance)
4. Change the description of the role of Cape Town Tourism, deleting its role of Destination Marketing, in its Constitution.
Clause 20.1 states that the Constitution can be amended by calling a general meeting of its members, with 21 days’ notice to be given to the members of Cape Town Tourism.
Chris von Ulmenstein, Whale Cottage Portfolio: www.whalecottage.com Twitter: @WhaleCottage