Egyptian hotels cannot officially refuse to accommodate tourists based on gender, but some hotels do. Judging by the complaints of tourists on social networks, Egyptian hotels began to refuse to accommodate single women. This information was published by local media, with a comment from the Ministry of Tourism that “hotels can not prevent women from booking for some reason.” Interestingly, the opposite trend is observed in Turkey: many hotels there refuse to accommodate single men.
According to Assistant Minister of Tourism and Antiquities Abdel Fattah Al-Assi, all hotels under the supervision of the Ministry of Tourism cannot prevent “neither a man nor a woman from staying in them for any reason, as long as the rooms are available.” He also added that some hotels operate under the supervision of local administrations and have prevented single women from booking rooms.
This comment was caused by the appeal of the Egyptian actress Nglaa Badr – she wrote in her account on social networks that she was forbidden to stay in a hotel near Alexandria. The ban was justified by the fact that she is a “single woman” and the hotel only accepts family guests. “They told me that I came without a husband, so they can’t accept me,” the actress said on the Al Hekaya talk show.
She stressed that she came to the hotel to work, the reservation was made by the company that hosted the event and invited her to take part in it, so she came to the booked hotel by invitation. According to her, other tourists were denied a hotel room reservation because they were “alone” without a family or husband. The government claims that such a measure is illegal.
Note that there is “reverse discrimination”. In Turkey, scandals have repeatedly arisen over the fact that many hotels do not accommodate two men in one room or even single men – the Internet has long been a list of more than 100 luxury hotels in Turkey that prohibit one or more men in their rooms without women. And one of the reasons for such a ban – is just concern for the safety of tourists who stayed in these hotels. Read the details at this link.