TWO MALAYSIAN MINISTRIES TO IDENTIFY FACTORS THAT DRAW AFRICANS TO M`SIA

KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 17 (Bernama) -- The Tourism Ministry and Home Ministry
will identify factors that draw Africans to Malaysia and who they are in an
effort to curb social problems involving this group of visitors.

Tourism Minister Dr Ng Yen Yen said not many Africans visited
this country as tourists but for certain purposes, "because we define tourists
as those who come here not to do business".

"I have discussed this matter with the home minister (Hishammuddin Hussein),
to study who these people are and what do they do here," she said in reply to a
supplementary question from Sapawi Ahmad, a member of Parliament (MP) in the
House of Representatives Tuesday.

Sapawi wanted to know what the government was doing to ensure that foreign
visitors, especially from Africa, do not create social problems.

To his original question, Dr Ng said tourist arrivals in Malaysia increased
by 14.3 per cent or to 2,078,485 in October this year compared with 1,818,304 in
the same month last year.

"From January to October this year, the increase was 7.2 per cent to 19.45
million compared with 18.14 million in the same period last year, with many of
the tourists coming from Singapore, Indonesia, Australia, India and the United
Kingdom."

However, she said, the United Nations World Tourism Organisation report
noted a drop in the number of tourists worldwide from January to July by seven
per cent or to 500 million compared with 540 million in the same period last
year.

-- BERNAMA