KOTA KINABALU: The Bohey Dulang island off Semporna has become one of the most popular tourist spots in Sabah, with 109,595 visitors last year, said Deputy Chief Minister Datuk Christina Liew.
She said the figures indicated an increase of 26.4 per cent for the same period compared to the previous year.
“Based on Sabah Parks data, there were 85,038 international tourists while domestic tourists stood at 24,557.
“As for the first six months of 2019, the arrivals to Bohey Dulang stood at 60,013, with international tourists at 43,204 and domestic tourists at 16,809,” she said during the question-and-answer session at the 15th State Assembly Sitting here today.
Liew, who is also state Tourism, Culture and Environment minister, was replying to a question by Datuk Abidin Madingkir (Upko-Paginatan) on the number of tourist arrivals to Semporna for 2018 and 2019.
To a supplementary question from Abidin on whether the recent incident of two China nationals and a local diving instructor who died from fish bombing off Kulapuan in Semporna had negatively affected the tourism industry, Liew said the impact was only the minimum.
“The ministry, through the Sabah Tourism Board, has planned and implemented several strategies to attract tourists from China by organising familiarisation trip for tour agencies from Hong Kong and Macau by including Sandakan in their trip.
“Among the upcoming projects in September include the ‘AirAsia Hong Kong and Macau agents Fam Trip to Sandakan, and Introducing Sabah Tour products to China nationals via social media such as Weibo and Wechat,” she added.
To another supplementary question by Datuk Joniston Bangkuai (Parti Bersatu Sabah-Kiulu) on whether Sabah is ready to accommodate some one million Turkish tourists following the recent signing of memorandum of agreement between the state government and Turkey, Liew urged all tourism players, including homestay operators, to welcome them.
This year, Sabah has targeted 4 million tourist arrivals to the state.