I had the opportunity to have dinner with Salomon Shamah, the new head of the ATP, along with several of the speakers of the American Chamber of Commerce tourism forum on Friday evening. It was a very informative dinner and we gained some insight into the man who is to lead Panama's efforts to promote itself to the world. I will elaborate on this in a later post, but the main thing that impressed me most was his understanding of the fact that 95% of all foreigners coming to Panama are here on business and never leave the city. He said his efforts were going to be focused on getting real tourist to come into the interior. Of course this is music to my ears as I have harped on this throughout the last administration. I found him to be extremely intelligent, quick witted and polite. He listed to everyone intently and usually had a strong opinion on issues, showing he has sent a great deal of time researching tourism issues in the country. Even though he does not have experience in the tourism industry, he is definitely a fast learner and his ability to engineer the campaign win for the new president shows clearly his ability to come up with unique strategies and manage resources effectively.
Eric Jackson of Panama News was at the tourism event and gave this report. You can read the rest of the story at his website.
Salomón Shamah has certain things in common with his predecessor, Rubén Blades. Like Blades and a number of other predecessors, he comes to lead the government's tourism promotion effort without any background in the tourism industry. (Shamah comes from the world of advertising and public relations, while Blades was an entertainer educated in law.) Shamah also has been given a seat and voice at the president's Cabinet meetings, but like his predecessor who had those things, has no vote in the Cabinet Council. (The Tourism Authority of Panama --- ATP --- like the IPAT tourism institute that preceded it, is an important governmental entity that's autonomous from the ministries, but it's not a ministry as such and the constitution restricts full Cabinet membership to the heads of ministries. Moreover, as Shamah is a naturalized Panamanian, another quirk in the constitution that Panama inherited from the dictatorship, the one that requires ministers to have been born Panamanian, would also exclude him from Cabinet membership.)
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