Hotels told jacket-and-tie rules are out

HOTELIERS have been told that the regulations which required ties and jackets to be worn in hotels must go.

Government sources said last night that the Minister of Information and Tourism, Dr Nathan Shamuyarira, had told hoteliers during a recent meeting that the tie-and-jacket requirement had to go “forthwith”.

The sources said they were correcting earlier reports which seemed to indicate that Government had compromised over the jacket-and-tie issue, in the meeting with hoteliers.

They said that Dr Shamuyarira had told the hoteliers “in no uncertain terms”, that the regulation had to be removed.

The sources said that although some hoteliers had put up strong pleas to the Ministers to maintain the ruling, “the Minister was adamant that the tie-and-jacket regulation should be scrapped.”

The controversy over the tie ruling surfaced on Tuesday evening last week when the ZANLA commander Rex Nhongo was arrested and later released, following a row at a city hotel at which ties were supposed to be worn.

A Government statement issued a few days after the incident said that the hoteliers should “take into account that variations occur in different forms of national dress.”

And last night, the sources said that Dr Shamuyarira, while echoing these sentiments, had told hoteliers that the “wearing of ties as a pre-requisite for entry into their premises was out.”

Some hoteliers told the Minister that the ties rule, would help to keep out “unruly white teenager elements”, while some spoke in favour of scrapping “outdated dress regulations saying, ‘we have to keep in step with the rest of the world’”, the sources said.

LESSONS FOR TODAY

It took an incident of a racial nature for hotel owners to realise that they could not have their cake and eat it, by forcing clients to wear jackets and ties as pre-requisites for entry into their premises.

These days, unless you are attending an official/formal function, there is no need to bother about putting on a tie and jacket. After all, most people go to hotels to relax over a glass of beer or wine.

People’s freedom of clothing has also gone overboard, depending on taste, age group and how well travelled one is. Jackets and ties are for the workplace, while some formal jobs do not bother about dress code.

You can still look smart with a tie and no jacket. And, depending on occasion, you can still be smart, without both jacket and tie. Men’s African attire is one best way to look smart and turn heads in any hotel.

The tropical hot weather makes one wonder why the jacket and tie are important in Southern Africa, considering that in West Africa, they have always nicknamed them the “swearing suit.” Maybe the saying that gentlemen have no weather is also true. Could this be why we still see men dressed up in jackets and ties in hotels, where there would be no formal functions?–herald.coz.w