Some international travellers are said to be stuck in hotels, lodges and camps around Maun and the Okavango delta as they fear to travel back to their home countries in the mid of the fast spreading and deadly Coronavirus.
Some of the guests’ visas have since expired and have been locked within Botswana borders when the country went into a lockdown this morning.
The owner of Crocodile camp in Maun, Reaboka Mbulawa has confirmed that he has at least four Danish tourists locked in his facility as no airline is flying out of the country.
“I can confirm that we do have two Danish couples who are stuck at Crocodile camp. They have since approached their embassy and are yet to get any help,” Mbulawa explained in a brief interview today.
This has presented a problem for Mbulawa’s business because lodges are not included in essential service operations which are to remain open during the 28 day lockdown.
“I think it was a mistake to exclude lodges. We cannot just chase out our clients. They were already in Botswana when this happened.”
According to Mbulawa his clients arrived in Botswana in February and were to leave end of March.
But because of cancellation of international flights they kept postponing their departure until their Visas expired, “hence the extension of their stay, but even that has expired too and now we had to give them a special room rate and cut our normal charge by half.”
He further added that their stay means he cannot simply shutdown the lodge as the skeletal staff needs to constantly take care of the guests needs.
