Lead Campaigner of the Trans Africa Tourism and Unity Campaign, Ras Mubarak, has recounted the thrilling 160-day road trip he and his eight-member team undertook across 31 African countries.
Speaking on Citi Eyewitness News on Friday, January 23, Ras Mubarak said the journey was designed to showcase Africa’s tourism potential, highlight the continent’s challenges, and urge policymakers to implement youth-friendly initiatives.
“The reason for the campaign is to push for visa-free travel across Africa by 2030,” he said, emphasising the importance of creating opportunities for youth employment.
He praised Cotonou, Benin, as a model for tourism development, noting the country’s well-maintained roads and deliberate efforts to position itself as a tourism hub.
The journey, however, was not without hurdles. Ras Mubarak recalled it took three months to secure a visa for Botswana. In Cameroon, the team faced difficulties at the land border because e-visas were not accepted, forcing them to drive ten hours back to Nigeria to obtain proper entry documents. Added roadblocks delayed their arrival in Cameroon’s capital by three days, with land border staff not working on Sundays.
Even in Benin, the team faced their first major challenge at the Cotonou border. Despite having complete documents, immigration officials demanded unofficial payments until the Ghanaian Embassy intervened to assist them.
Ras Mubarak also addressed misconceptions about Equatorial Guinea being an unsafe place. He shared the team’s adventurous experience of eating python meat.
“You can actually walk into any market and buy python meat; the same way you go to the market and buy goat meat. It is meat. For me, it is one of the exciting things about Africa, the diverse cultures, and we need to explore.”
He added that in Namibia, they tried worms, while in Zimbabwe, they were impressed by WiFi availability even at land borders. However, they got lost in one of Africa’s most exotic game reserves and underestimated travel time to Harare, leaving them stranded in the dark with no internet.
“We blasted a tyre, and nobody wanted to get out of the two cars in the pitch dark. We had to brave it, standing guard while two team members fixed the tyre,” he recalled.
Other challenges included election-related border lockdowns in Tanzania, a Marburg virus outbreak in Ethiopia, and a truck veering into their lane in Zambia, damaging one of their vehicles. Ras Mubarak praised the Ghanaian embassies for assistance during these incidents.
He said the team flew from Zambia to Morocco, hoping to airlift the vehicles and drive them down to West Africa. However, Mauritania refused to issue visas for what he described as “parochial” reasons.
“The EU gives them crumbs to keep West African nationals from passing through Mauritania. It is a tragedy,” he said.
He was quick to add that, in their quest to return to West Africa, they had to fly from Morocco to Paris before catching a flight back to Algeria, despite the two countries being neighbors.
“That is another area that the AU needs to fix, because the Moroccans and the Algerians have not been in talking terms for a long time,” he added.
Despite the obstacles, Ras Mubarak said the journey fueled his desire to see Africa prosper, emphasising the need for policy reforms, improved infrastructure, and greater collaboration between African nations.
He praised Africa’s natural beauty and the intentional push to create diverse tourism hubs, describing the continent as a breathtaking place to see and live in.
