World Tourism Network OPINION
When a country sells itself to travelers as welcoming, humane and safe, accepting unwanted deportees in return for financial or diplomatic benefits creates a contradiction no tourism campaign can easily erase.
There is a price for almost everything in international diplomacy. But there are some payments a country should think very carefully about accepting.
Across Africa, governments have been entering agreements with the United States to receive people deported from the US who are not citizens of the receiving country, may never have visited it, may not speak its languages and may have no family, cultural or social connection there.
Amnesty International describes the expanding practice of US “third country removals” as unlawful and says it can expose deportees to arbitrary detention, inadequate access to lawyers and potentially serious human-rights violations.
According to Amnesty International, African countries reported to have concluded third-country removal agreements with the United States include Cameroon, Cape Verde, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Equatorial Guinea, Eswatini, Ghana, Liberia, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, South Sudan and Uganda.
That is not an insignificant list.
It includes countries attempting to attract international visitors, investment and conferences, and governments spending considerable resources positioning themselves as welcoming, stable and responsible members of the global tourism community.
The Central African Republic provides one of the latest disturbing illustrations. Human Rights Watch reported that people of other nationalities were deported there from the United States despite CAR’s own fragility after decades of conflict and a prolonged humanitarian crisis.
The argument against these arrangements is rightly being made primarily in terms of human rights and international law.
But Africa’s tourism industry should be asking another question:
What could this do to our reputation?
A tourism brand is built on trust
Tourism ministries spend millions trying to convince the world of a simple proposition:
Come to our country. You will be welcome here. “Welcome” may be one of the most valuable words in tourism.
Destinations advertise warmth, hospitality, friendship, safety, cultural openness and respect. Governments hire international public-relations agencies, attend expensive tourism fairs, host influencers, sponsor international events and launch glossy campaigns designed to create positive emotional associations with their countries.
Then another branch of the same government can make one political decision that tells an entirely different story.
If international headlines begin associating a destination with controversial deportation arrangements, unwanted migrants, detention, possible refoulement and payments or political concessions from a powerful foreign government, the tourism ministry inherits a reputational problem it did not create.
That matters because destination image is not some abstract marketing concept.
Research has repeatedly demonstrated that political conditions and perceptions influence destination image and travelers’ intentions to recommend a country. Tourism research has also consistently emphasized that destination image plays an important role in consumer travel behavior.
Research published in the International Journal of Tourism Research in 2026 examined an increasingly relevant phenomenon: tourism boycotts. It found that boycotts can deter tourists from destinations and cause immediate as well as longer-term damage, requiring tourism authorities to rebuild traveler confidence and repair reputational harm.
That should be required reading in every tourism ministry whose government is considering one of these agreements.
Cape Verde, Ghana, Rwanda and Uganda have tourism brands to protect
The potential contradiction becomes particularly apparent when looking at some of the countries involved.
- Cape Verdehas successfully developed an international reputation around islands, beaches, culture, music and hospitality.
- Ghanahas invested heavily in diaspora tourism and its emotional connection with the African diaspora, particularly through initiatives encouraging people of African descent to visit, reconnect and invest.
- Rwandahas spent enormous energy developing a premium international tourism identity around conservation, mountain gorillas, meetings and conferences, and high-value tourism.
- Uganda, with its wildlife, national parks and mountain gorillas, continues working to increase its share of the international African tourism market.
- Sierra Leoneis attempting to rebuild and expand an international tourism identity based around its beaches, culture, heritage and natural attractions.
These are valuable national assets.
Their governments therefore need to consider whether the immediate diplomatic or financial benefits of accepting US deportees could introduce a new and completely unnecessary reputational liability. The issue is not whether tourists are already canceling trips because of these agreements. There is no credible basis for making that claim.
The issue is whether governments have adequately assessed the possibility that they could.
The money is visible. The tourists who don’t come are invisible.
There is an obvious temptation for governments.
Developing countries need investment. They need hospitals, infrastructure, development assistance, jobs and access to powerful international partners. And Washington has money and influence.
A February 2026 report released by Democratic members of the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee examined the financial and diplomatic costs associated with the Trump administration’s expanding third-country deportation system.
According to information cited by Amnesty International, more than US$32 million had reportedly been paid directly to five third countries, including African states, in connection with accepting removals.
There may also be broader incentives.
Diplomatic reporting has indicated that migration arrangements have formed part of wider negotiations involving trade, development assistance, health funding and bilateral relations.
For a government confronting enormous development needs, such incentives are difficult to ignore. But tourism policymakers need to understand the difference between visible revenue and invisible loss.
A government can record a US$10 million, US$20 million or US$30 million payment. It appears in an agreement. It can be announced. It can be budgeted. It can be spent.
But nobody issues an invoice when thousands of travelers quietly decide not to come.
- Nobody sends the finance minister a spreadsheet identifying the international conference that selected another country.
- Nobody calculates the tour operator that quietly reduces capacity.
- Nobody counts the honeymoon couple that chooses another island.
- Nobody records the European traveler who reads disturbing headlines, feels uncomfortable and books somewhere else.
- Nobody necessarily tells the tourism board why.
Those losses appear differently: fewer hotel nights, weaker forward bookings, reduced destination desirability, lost conferences, hesitant investors and a national brand that becomes just a little harder to sell.
That is precisely why reputational damage is so dangerous.
Governments can count the dollars they receive. They cannot easily count the travelers they never knew they lost.
Travelers increasingly carry values in their suitcases
The traditional assumption that tourists care only about beaches, wildlife, weather and price is increasingly outdated.
Travel has become political and ethical.
Consumers debate whether they should visit destinations because of environmental policies, human rights, treatment of minorities, animal welfare, wars, authoritarianism, discrimination and migration policies.
Not every traveler will boycott a country over human-rights concerns. Most probably will not. But tourism does not require everyone to change their mind for economic damage to occur.
- Destinations compete against dozens of alternatives.
- A traveler considering a safari has choices.
- A traveler looking for an African beach holiday has choices.
- A convention organizer considering an African destination has choices.
- An international company deciding where to hold an incentive program has choices.
- If two destinations offer similarly attractive products, a negative ethical or reputational association can become the deciding factor.
- And the potential damage extends beyond leisure tourism.
International conferences, universities, NGOs, multinational companies, sporting organizations and associations increasingly consider sustainability, ESG principles, human-rights exposure and institutional reputation when deciding where to organize events, establish partnerships or invest.
A controversial migration agreement therefore risks becoming much more than an immigration story. It can become a country-brand story.
What happens when the visitor comes from the United States?
There is another irony African tourism leaders should consider.
The United States itself is an important source market for African tourism. African destinations spend money trying to attract US visitors.
Tourism boards attend trade shows in the United States. Airlines develop routes serving the US market. Hotels and safari companies market to affluent US travelers. African governments promote diaspora travel and encourage Americans to discover the continent.
At the same time, some of those governments may be accepting people the US government wants removed from its territory.
That creates an unusual relationship.
- The country is effectively saying to the United States:
- Send us your tourists.
- Send us your investors.
- Send us your conferences.
- And send us people you do not want.
African tourism leaders should at least ask whether those messages belong in the same national strategy.
Africa has already been warned
The African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights has taken an unusually clear position on such migration arrangements.
In Resolution 645, adopted in 2025, it called on African states to make agreements concerning the reception or detention of migrants and asylum seekers public.
It reaffirmed the obligation to protect life, dignity and fundamental rights and stated that migration cooperation must respect non-refoulement, due process and humane, non-discriminatory treatment.
Most significantly, the Commission condemned agreements or practices leading to collective expulsions and forced transfers without individual examination and encouraged African alternatives to asymmetrical migration partnerships.
That last word deserves attention:
Asymmetrical.
The United States wants people removed from its territory. A poorer country may need money, investment, trade opportunities, health funding or diplomatic favor. That is not an equal negotiating table.
African governments therefore need to ask whether they are receiving compensation for providing a legitimate service — or whether they are being paid to absorb another country’s politically difficult problem along with the human-rights and reputational consequences that may accompany it.
Agreements behind closed doors create another problem: suspicion
The secrecy surrounding some of these arrangements makes the reputational danger worse. When governments do not disclose exactly what they have agreed to, speculation fills the vacuum.
- How much is being paid?
- How many people will arrive?
- What happens to them?
- Can they be detained?
- Can they leave?
- Can they work?
- Can they claim asylum?
- Who pays for their housing and security?
- Can they challenge their transfer?
- Could they ultimately be returned to a country where they risk persecution or torture?
And what exactly did the receiving government get in return?
If governments cannot answer these questions openly, international audiences may reach their own conclusions. For tourism destinations, secrecy is rarely a substitute for reputation management.
Imagine the tourism advertisement
There is an uncomfortable test governments should perform before signing these agreements. Put the migration agreement next to the tourism advertisement.
One ministry says:
Welcome to our beautiful country. Experience our legendary hospitality.
Another effectively says:
We will accept people who have no connection to our country because the United States wants them removed.
Those messages cannot remain completely separated in the digital age.
Search engines do not distinguish between the Ministry of Tourism and the Ministry of Interior. Neither does social media. Neither does international news coverage.
A country’s reputation is one ecosystem. Every ministry contributes to it — or damages it.
Emerging African destinations have more to lose
For established global destinations with enormous tourism brands, a political controversy can sometimes be absorbed.
Emerging destinations have less protection.
Countries attempting to develop ecotourism, cultural tourism, meetings and conventions, luxury travel, diaspora tourism and international aviation connectivity are still building their identities.
Trust is therefore an economic asset.
Once a destination becomes associated internationally with controversial deportation arrangements, detention, secret agreements or allegations of human-rights violations, tourism officials may spend years — and millions — trying to replace those associations with images of national parks, beaches, culture and smiling hospitality workers.
That is an extraordinarily inefficient way to build a tourism economy.
Tourism ministers need a seat at the negotiating table
This issue should not remain confined to presidents, foreign ministries, immigration departments and finance ministries. Tourism ministries should have a voice.
So should hotel associations, tour operators, airlines, convention bureaus, chambers of commerce and tourism investment authorities.
Before another agreement is signed, they should ask their governments:
- What exactly is the country receiving?
- What obligations are being accepted?
- How many people could be transferred?
- What legal protections will those people receive?
- What happens if international human-rights organizations condemn the arrangement?
- What happens if disturbing photographs or stories emerge?
- What happens if activists begin calling for a tourism boycott?
- What happens if international conferences reconsider the destination?
- And has anyone conducted a tourism and country-brand impact assessment?
If the answer to that final question is no, governments may be negotiating with only half a balance sheet.
Human dignity has economic value too
The strongest argument against potentially abusive deportation arrangements should remain the simplest one:
Human beings should not become diplomatic cargo.
People should not be transported across continents to countries with which they have no relationship merely because one government has enough political and financial leverage to persuade another government to accept them.
There are serious questions of international law, due process and human dignity involved. Those questions must come first.
But governments unmoved by the moral argument should at least consider the economic one.
- Tourism is built upon perception.
- Hospitality is built upon trust.
- Investment is built upon confidence.
- Destination brands are built over decades and can be damaged remarkably quickly.
A few million dollars transferred into government accounts today may look attractive.
- A trade concession may look attractive.
- Development assistance may look attractive.
- Political goodwill in Washington may look attractive.
But none of those benefits should be evaluated without calculating the other side of the equation.
If an agreement causes travelers, investors, conference organizers, tour operators, airlines and international partners to question what a country stands for, its true price may emerge much later.
And by then, the payment may already have been spent.
Africa should not underestimate the economic value of being regarded as welcoming.
It should not underestimate the value of international trust.
And no government should underestimate the potential cost of becoming internationally known as a destination where people unwanted by another country can be sent — for money, political concessions or diplomatic favor.
Juergen Steinmetz, Chairman WTN, warned: “ A US deportation agreement can be signed overnight. A damaged tourism reputation can take a generation to repair.“
Leave a Comment