Tourism specialists believe Thailand could be facing a decline of 2-3 percent in arrivals in 1998. If this scenario proves correct, hoteliers who have been so vocal in opposition to travel agents and local currency quotes will reverse their stand. This is hardly the time for hardnosed pricing. At least one enlightened Bangkok hotelier admitted last week the hotels had gone too far. We had the wrong spokesman, instead of creating a partnership with travel agents we encouraged division.
Some hoteliers recognise that it was a mistake to accuse agents of price-gouging.
A compromise between hotels and the Association of Thai Travel Agents should be hammered out before the International Tourism Exchange opens in Berlin next month. Already the ATTA has hinted it would accept rate increases of 30 or 40 percent as long as hoteliers honoured current rates for the duration of the contracts. The government has even loaned him some money to live on, and he lives under our supervision. Khun Sa, once a powerful controller of drugs flowing from the infamous Golden Triangle along Burma's northeastern border, surrendered to the Burmese government in 1996. He has not been in the public eye since his surrender and little is known about his activities.