Trouble in paradise - SKETCHES by Ana Marie Pamintuan

At the Barcelo Pearl Farm on the "island garden city of Samal" in Davao, I asked for directions so I could visit an adjacent fishing village. There were no tours to the village, I was told. But I could go there through the resort’s side exit, accompanied by a guide.

The guide turned out to be one of the resort’s security guards. He held a two-way radio as we walked on the narrow road roughly hewn out of hard coral. Under his loose shirt with gay tropical print I suspected there was a gun. He was familiar with the village, where most of the resort’s employees lived, but Pearl Farm wasn’t taking any chances with its guests.

At around 11 p.m. on May 22, as you probably know, armed men on a motorized banca tried to dock at a wharf next to the resort and were accosted by security officer Jimmy Kulam. There was an exchange of gunfire; Kulam and mechanic Rolando Jara were fatally shot. The dock and two speedboats of the resort were damaged. Nope, my security escort wasn’t taking any chances.

What happened to the raiders? A government official told me that the bandits were pursued by cops and soldiers. Some were "neutralized" while others escaped. The official version is that the marauders, believed to be members of a "lost command" of the Moro Islamic Liberation Front, were gunrunners who simply lost their way and did not intend to attack Pearl Farm.

"This is an island paradise," Samal Mayor Roger Antalan said last week. "But once in a while a snake comes in… this is a very peaceful place."

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Pearl Farm is a tropical paradise, with accommodations good enough to land in a coffee table book on tropical design. Like other exclusive resorts, it promotes ecotourism. By the light of the moon you can see fish resting close to shore. The real pearl farm was shut down a few years back, but the resort has enough coral beds and other underwater attractions to delight visitors.

It is also possibly the most expensive resort facility in this country, with room rates starting at $130 and exquisite four-bedroom "villas" on neighboring Malipano island costing $660 a night. People who can afford to pay those prices to get away from it all obviously demand utmost privacy and security.

How to contain the fallout from the May 22 "misencounter"?

That’s the difficult task now facing Barcelo Empresas, which formally took over management of Pearl Farm from the Floirendo family only on April 21. The Barcelo Group, based in Majorca, Spain, operates 113 mid-market to high-end international hotels and resorts in 19 countries worldwide.

Barcelo Empresas is moving the bulk of its regional operations from Shanghai to Manila, and I laud the company for wanting to stick it out here despite the attacks at Pearl Farm and Dos Palmas in Palawan.

Police boats now patrol the waters around the Samal group of islands. You hear the occasional whir of an Air Force helicopter overhead. More soldiers and policemen have also been deployed around the resorts.

Officials of Samal and Davao like to say that "the safest places in the Philippines today are Davao and Palawan." Barcelo’s manager at Pearl Farm, Alex Groizard, seems to believe this.

Groizard, a native of the Basque region in Spain, points out that his homeland has its share of terrorist attacks, and so do industrialized countries such as Britain, Germany and, why not, the United States. He notes that terrorist attacks against foreign visitors have not deterred tourists from going to the pyramids of Egypt or the holy places of Israel.

In Spain, however, the press does not play up such terrorist attacks "because we love our country," Groizard told me. So why do we sensationalize such attacks in the Philippines, he asked, when this is "such a beautiful country?"

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That’s a line that Tourism Secretary Richard Gordon is promoting amid the ongoing crisis. He can be pugnacious (Why don’t you just drop dead, he tells his detractors), but you have to admire Gordon’s rah-rah spirit these days when the tourism industry seems to be falling apart.

Pearl Farm has not been hit hard by the attacks on resorts. There were a few cancellations shortly after the May 22 "misencounter" but some are rebooking, Groizard said.

Art Boncato Jr., president of the Davao Tourism Association and director of sales and marketing at the five-star Marco Polo hotel, also told me that the fallout on Davao tourism from the Pearl Farm raid has been minimal, unlike last year when cancellations were "awful" because of the Abu Sayyaf hostage crisis.

The bigger fallout this time appears to have hit Palawan, where 200 Japanese tourists cancelled their booking in the upscale El Nido resort following a travel advisory from the Japanese Embassy.

Gordon tried to contain the damage by seeking out Japanese media and addressing the Japanese. He reminded them of the fatal sarin gas attack in Tokyo. If they allowed themselves to be scared by terrorists in the Philippines, then terrorism would have won, he reminded the Japanese. "Why should you reward these terrorists?" he asked.

I don’t know if Gordon’s pitch will work – I heard that the tourism industry in Palawan is devastated – but I give him an A for trying. Any Filipino who has ever been to Palawan will feel bad that one sneak attack can scare away tourists from that beautiful province. Palawan is one place I always try to sell to foreigners whenever I’m abroad.

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The attacks on Pearl Farm and Dos Palmas are just among the hurdles that Gordon must overcome in his new job. He has lost 17 pounds since assuming his post, he said, and for a while he seemed ready to give it up. But now the crisis appears to have energized him.

"I’m a fighter," he said. "Like Pearl Harbor, we’re gonna come back."

He has prepared a program to increase Filipinos’ awareness of the income-generating potentials of the tourism industry. One slogan declares: Pag may turista, may kita. Loose translation: If there are tourists, there’s money to be earned.

"The problem with tourism in this country is that we haven’t realized it creates money. I want to make the common man on the street consider tourism as an opportunity," Gordon said. "Tourism is the most possible industry in the Philippines. Tourism is pump-priming."

Gordon mouths these lines like a mantra, as if saying them over and over will cast a spell to make them come true.

His biggest problem, as in other government agencies, is funding. Gordon believes the country has all the tourist attractions it needs, and all that’s needed is aggressive marketing.

"We have a good movie showing in the Philippines. The problem is we don’t advertise that it’s now showing," he said.

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Marketing, naturally, does not come cheap. The Philippines has to contend with other countries that have invested heavily in tourism promotion. Thailand’s marketing budget for this year is $49.5 million; Malaysia, $70 million; Hong Kong, $66 million. The entire budget of the Department of Tourism for this year is P500 million, of which P40 million is earmarked for marketing, and 45 percent is allocated for personnel. The budget of Puerto Princesa alone is bigger at P900 million.

Last year, Vietnam overtook us in terms of tourist arrivals, getting 2.02 million visitors against our 1.8 million. For next year, Gordon is seeking a $15-million budget for his department, or about P1.2 billion. I wish him luck.

Budget problems also hobble our military and police, limiting their capability to protect not just tourists but the citizenry. The Abu Sayyaf bandits who raided Dos Palmas, for example, fled on a kumpit with three 200-horsepower engines costing $18,000 each. The kumpit, which costs about P7 million, could travel at 35 knots; Coast Guard patrol craft, on the other hand, can go no faster than 25 knots. Is that why the Abu Sayyaf managed to give its pursuers from Dos Palmas the slip?

Senior Superintendent Eduardo Matillano of the Southern Mindanao Command told me the government is acquiring some of those powerful boat engines. I asked him where they intended to get the money and he couldn’t give me an answer.

Gordon refuses to be deterred. "Perhaps we could have fewer bandits," he said, "if we have more tourism."