Prince Mushawevato recently in Victoria Falls
The night is young, our pockets are loaded. Here is the deal: Can you show us the hot spots? This is the typical demand of a tourist who has come from far in search of fun.
In tourism circles, it is said travellers do not visit exotic destinations to sleep.

For instance, Barbadians say when the sun goes down in Barbados, the party is just beginning. Travel anywhere on the islands and you are certain to find a place to let loose long into the night.

From beaches to bars, there is something for everyone to enjoy beneath the light of the Barbadian moon. Sadly the same cannot be said of one of the country’s most popular

attractions, Victoria Falls.

Naturally, tourists are 24-hour creatures, roaring lions by day and active bats by night. When done with safari activities, boat cruises, flight tours as well as wining and dining, what is left is to paint the night red.
But Victoria Falls is not offering these enthusiastic painters enough canvass to express themselves on. During the recently held 37th edition of the annual Africa Travel

Association (ATA) congress, delegates who attended the event were not amused and expressed dissatisfaction after being starved of entertainment during the dark hours.
“There is only a single upmarket club and I think it is not enough to cater for all the tourists,” said one American delegate only identified as Martha.
The Zimbabwe Tourism Authority (ZTA) concurred, adding the unavailability of top-notch entertainment was not good for the tourism industry.

Speaking on the sidelines of the ATA congress, ZTA chief executive Mr Karikoga Kaseke said promoters had to up their game in the resort town to complete the country’s destinations.

“It is an open secret that about 50 percent of our tourists are against the kind of leisure that we offer. Against this background, we are working to improve the leisure area, particularly after hours, so that tourists enjoy both sides of the day (night and day). These visitors need something to talk about when they return home. I have discovered through my interaction with them that we are depriving them of nightlife,” he said.

The ZTA boss said notes would be taken from other countries that are favourites of international visitors.
“We are currently looking at what other countries are doing, but our focus is restricted to this region only. We are not going to follow the European patterns. Our attention will be on Botswana, Namibia, South Africa, Malawi and Zambia, among others,” said Mr Kaseke.

The tourism boss said soon the country’s nightlife would be competing with the best in the region.
“We cannot continue to live in the past; centres need to be brightened up so that they can cater for international visitors. It is against this background that we should always develop our leisure centres for them to meet international standards. Since this is an issue that requires urgent attention, we are sure that in the next two or three years, we will have made necessary improvements. We have benchmarked ourselves against South Africa, but we need to be better than them,” he said.

This reporter duly noted that there was a vacuum in terms of club competition. Contest exists only between two clubs — the Hunters and the Wildthing — while third joint Invuvu is rather low profile.

Hunters is excellent if you want to last the night and enjoy good music while the Wildthing, though exquisite, is quite unpopular with locals due to high admission fees.
Meanwhile, the country’s music superstar, Oliver “Tuku’” Mtukudzi, gave a spirited performance during culture night. The veteran musician had earlier on promised at a Press conference to deliver a top-of-the-shelf act, and he did just that.

It was the musician’s scintillating voice and instruments on his songs Tozeza Baba and Mbombera that almost got elephants, buffaloes and lions on the dance floor.