Tourism Malaysia opens Middle East regional promotion office in Dubai

 Malaysia, whose successful marketing drive during the current year helped spur arrivals from the Middle East by nearly 100% over 1999, has opened a regional office in Dubai to co-ordinate promotional activities in the region. The move was revealed by Director General of Tourism Malaysia, Abdullah Jonid, who was in Dubai recently. The Dubai office will be headed by Tourism Malaysia’s recently appointed regional marketing consultant for the Middle East, Aminuddin Abdul Hamid.

According to Abdullah Jonid, the new regional office has been given the responsibility of coordinating the marketing, promotions, public relations and trade relations activities of the country in Egypt, Iran, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Syria, the UAE and, when current sanctions are lifted, Iraq. “Following the Middle East tour of our Minister of Culture, Arts and Tourism, His Excellency Dato Kadir Sheikh Fadzir, in April this year, we have concentrated our focus on developing tourist arrivals from this region, and the results have been very promising,” said Abdullah Jonid. “With the Dubai set-up in place, along with the activities of the recently opened office in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, we are targeting significantly more arrivals from the Middle East in 2001,” he added.

Tourism Malaysia’s new man on the spot, Aminuddin Abdul Hamid, is a marketing veteran in the region, previously having worked for various organizations in Saudi Arabia for close to a decade.