Constance hotels recruit 83 Mauritians |10 June 2021
Eighty-three Mauritian workers arrived in the country last night to work for Constance Ephelia on Mahé and Constance Lemuria on Praslin as taskforce for a period of two months.
They travelled from Mauritius on board a chartered Air Seychelles flight which touched down at the Seychelles International Airport last night.
News of their arrival started circulating last weekend, but all attempts by Seychelles NATION, since Monday, to establish with the department of employment why such a big group of foreigners has been granted gainful occupation permit (GOP) to come into the country to work, have gone answered.
The Mauritian workers are from three Constance hotels in Mauritius ‒ Constance Belle Mare Plage, Constance Prince Maurice and C Mauritius.
On Monday June 7, 2021, Seychelles NATION contacted the employment department on the subject and we were asked to send an email with questions and until yesterday, we had not received answers to our questions. We even called the employment department and were told to wait.
Seychelles NATION contacted Constance Ephelia general manager Stephane Duchenne to query why the hotel has had to bring in Mauritian workers when Seychellois are unemployed, and his answer was: “We do not have enough employees.”
He also shared a statement with Seychelles NATION which reads:
"Manning constraint has forced us to consider stopping sales above a certain level of occupancy for our two properties ‒ Ephelia and Lemuria. This was clearly not good for the national economy which needs as much tourism revenue possible to drive economic recovery and we believe that this should be avoided as much as possible.
“Following the re-opening of the country’s frontiers on March 25, we have been inundated with demand from new markets. This news, while a cause for celebration, magnifies our critical manpower situation, and hence the request to socialise a short-term manning solution for Lemuria and Ephelia resorts.
“We have been able to recruit almost 150 Seychellois for the two resorts, but this is still insufficient and unfortunately we could not find additional fully trained employees on the market in this short period of time and be ready to welcome our guests in high occupancies. Further, the newly hired employees need time to be trained to our standards and be fully operational.
“A task force of 83 employees from the Constance hotels in Mauritius have therefore been permitted by the Ministry of Employment and Social affairs to join the Constance Seychelles properties for a period of two months, as from June 9, 2021 until their departure early August.
“52 employees will be working at the Constance Ephelia and 31 employees will be working at the Constance Lemuria. We have chartered an Air Seychelles flight to bring the employees from Mauritius, who will all be fully vaccinated.
“In the meantime, we continue our recruitment campaign to attract local talent in the Seychelles. We believe that in two months, our newly hired candidates will be fully trained, and that we should be able to fill most of our vacancies.
“The success of our hotels in Seychelles is mostly due to the professionalism and spirit of our team, and the genuine and personalised service that we offer. I wish to take this opportunity to thank all our team members for their dedication and relentless efforts in these challenging times.
“The Constance hotels in the Seychelles have a responsibility to deliver a five-star service experience, representing the expectations of the international travellers visiting the Seychelles.
“We seize this opportunity to thank the concerned authorities who have supported this temporary solution."
Seychelles NATION also gathered that the recruitment process for Seychellois at Constance Ephelia took place between April and May and that training is ongoing.
“We need more workers as the number of arrivals keeps increasing and we have to provide the service to the level of our clients’ expectations. It takes time for employees to be trained and feel comfortable,” added Mr Duchene.
Gerard Govinden