Assessing the Threats and Possibilities of Tourism development in Ethiopia: Tirusina Shrine in Oromo Special Zone

Ethiopia is a country of varied natural and cultural tourist potentials. Still, the country is not fully used its potential tourism resources because of lack of infrastructure, road transport, inadequate facilities, lack of skilled manpower, lack of awareness about tourism resources for the socio-economic development of the country. For the past decades, the culture and tourism offices at both regional and Oromo zone of Jille Dhumuga district did not work a lot to advertise the region's tourism potential sites by Television and radio programs, on Facebook and other websites to increase the flow of tourist arrivals in the district. Since there is a dearth of written material that deals with the importance of the Tirusina Shrine as a tourism site, the researcher, therefore, depends on some oral traditions and interviews, questionnaires, field surveys or observations to realize this study. Furthermore, both primary and secondary sources existing were wisely used and analyzed in an apt method. Based on the investigation and analysis of these sources, the writer concluded that to understand the values of tourism, further identification of the tourism sites and a well-organized work associated with tourism potentials of the site should be conducted in the southern part of the Wallo zone especially on Oromo Zone of Amhara national regional state. Article History Received: 12 February 2020 Accepted: 19 March 2020

IDRIS, Current Research Journal of Social Sciences, Vol. 03(1), 123-133 (2020) and availability of public and religious holidays and festivals, the international tourist arrivals steadily grew in 1950. During the beginning of the new millennium, the number of international tourists increases in a very large number. 1 Eastern Africa is the leading destination in sub-Saharan Africa. 2 As it is cited in Astbha, according to the report of the United Nations economic commission for Africa, tourism played a major role in the development of countries such as Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Ethiopia, Seychelles and more recently Rwanda. 3 Before the beginning of the tourism industry in Ethiopia, the country's economic backbone is highly prospered for many years on agricultural products. This view is not to articulate that all in all the Ethiopia's economic base is nowadays shifted towards tourism but the share of the sector for the development of the county's economy is increasing from time to time. 4 Tourism is an important strategy for socio-economic development for countries that have rich historical, religious and socio-cultural sites. Ethiopia is not exceptional in this case. The country is rich in multidimensional heritage and tourist attraction sites. Before we go depth to our aim of study lets define what is tourism?
Tourism is a field of study which is extremely broad and defined differently by different scholars. The most widely accepted definition for the sector was given by urban tourism and heritage planning manual which clearly stated that "it is a composite of activities, services, and industries that delivers a travel experience to individuals and groups traveling fifty miles or more from their homes for pleasure." As it is stated above, tourism is one of the largest and rapidly growing economic sectors in developed countries and the world. 6 It is argued that the tourism sector is one of the least developed sectors in Africa in general and in the context of Ethiopia in particular because the sector is found in its infant stage. 7 In Ethiopia, tourism is becoming an important sector contributing a great deal towards the social, cultural, and economic development aspects of the country. As of 2011, international tourist arrivals reached 980 million and its receipts were 1,030 billion USD.
For advanced economies, the contribution of tourism to GDP ranges from approximately 2% to over 10%. 8 As cited in Ashenafi according to UNWTO (2015), International tourist arrivals (overnight visitors) hit a record 1133 million worldwide in 2014, up from 1087 million in 2013. Likewise, international tourism receipts earned by destinations worldwide have grown to US$ 1245 billion in 2014 up from US$ 1197 billion in 2013. 9 According to the ministry of culture and tourism report, Ethiopia has hosted a total of 478,890 foreign tourists during the first two quarters of 2015. Similarly, the country has also earned 1,792,964,160 US dollars from international tourists. This income surpasses the income registered in 2015 by 404,842,160 US dollars. 10 Ethiopia's tourism industry is one of the economic sectors which started functioning recently as the economic backbone of the country in addition to agriculture and export commodities like coffee, skin, and others. 11 It suffices to say that Ethiopia has almost all types of primary tourist products: historical attractions, natural attractions like national parks with endemic wildlife, lakes, mountains, rivers, different types of fauna and flora and cultural as well as religious festivals and pilgrimages. In Ethiopia, UNESCO recognizes nine world heritage sites (as many as Morocco, and South Africa and more than any other country in Africa): Axum obelisks, the monolithic churches of Lalibela, Gondar's castles, the Omo Valley, Awash valley, Konso Cultural landscape, Tiya carved standing Stones, Semien National, Park, and the walled city of Harar, etc. 12 Despite this, the country is not benefited from the sector as the country was endowed by beautiful cultural as well as natural tourist attraction sites. Observably in most developed countries, the sector has the largest share in the overall economic growth and development of a country. The tourism sector has now become a major source of income generation and serves as a source of employment for various stakeholders engaged in the sector. 13 In this regard, as the researcher tried to discuss in this paper, despite Ethiopia's endowment with various natural and man-made heritage, it had not benefited much from the sector for years due to IDRIS, Current Research Journal of Social Sciences, Vol. 03(1), 123-133 (2020) various factors that the researcher discussed in detail in the forthcoming issues.
Ethiopia is one of the countries endowed by cultural and natural tourist attraction sites which bears a variety of tourism resources and this makes the country get much more attention in terms of tourism. Because the country has potential as one of the centers of tourism sites in the world as it has unique creatures, ancient and wonderful architectural designs and styles. 14

The Objectives of the Study General Objective
The main objective of this study is to assess the challenges and opportunities of tourism development in the Oromo Special zone of the Amhara region: the case of the Tirusina shrine.

Specific Objective
The specific objectives of this study were,

•
To identify the tourism potential sites in the study area. • To identify the major challenges that hinder the development of tourism in the Tirusina Shrine. • To explore the main opportunities for tourism development in the study area.

Ethical Consideration
Ethical issues are the concerns and dilemmas that arise over the proper way to execute research, more specifically not to create harmful conditions for the subjects of inquiry, humans, in the research process. 15 Any research conducted with the involvement of human beings/hosts needs to be guided by ethical principles; informant consent, confidentiality, and anonymity. 16 Thus, permission to study this research was approved by the Culture and Tourism offices of the Oromo zone and the Woreda and Kebele offices of the study area.
The study was conducted by considering the ethics of the research. Accordingly, in the courses of primary data collection, every informant was informed about the purpose of the study. The researcher interviewed them and arranged FGD as well as conducted observation-only based on their informed consent. Besides, the author kept the confidentiality of those informants involved in the case studies.

Research Design
Relevant and necessary data were needed for this article to reach a conclusion and to answer the threats and possibilities of tourism development in Ethiopia in the case of the Tirusina shrine in Oromo Zone. Therefore, it employed a qualitative and quantitative approach to collect the necessary and relevant data. The study was also needed to conduct the necessary and reliable information by reviewing the available documents and needed to make a link or connection between different variables contributing to the challenge of the tourism sector in the Tirusina shrine of Jille Dhumuga district. The descriptive research design was also used to obtain precise information concerning the current status of the Tirusina shrine. By using a descriptive research design, the researcher was able to identify the major problems for the development of tourism in the study area. In addition to this, the researcher used field observation to assess the condition of tourism developments in Jille Dhumuga district.

Data Collection Methods The Primary Data Collection Mechanism
For this study, the researcher used the relevant primary data through qualitative strategies such as interviews, Focus group discussion, and direct observations.

Interviews
The researcher used all the types of interviews to accomplish the task. The first is a structured interview. The researcher set out a list of questions and follow it as much as possible. The second is a semi-structured interview. The author only asked the questions from a list but also the researcher used to ask further questions which arose from the answers provided by informants. The third is an unstructured interview, in this case, the researcher gives different general questions to different informants. In general, the researcher interviewed interviewees from different backgrounds by Afaan Oromo and Amharic because of its suitability to the people of the study area.

Questionnaires
The questionnaires were used as data collection techniques because it saves time and able to cover a large number of respondents and also it is very easy. The researcher administered both open and close-ended questions. The researcher used this instrument because it gives freedom for the respondents to explain their ideas and feelings without any restrictions. This technique enables the researcher to identify the major threats for tourism development in the area of the study and to find out the communities' awareness about tourism resources for economic as well as socio-cultural benefits of the community.

Focus Group Discussion
Focus group discussion is one of the methods that the researcher was used for this study as a means of primary data collection techniques. The researcher conducted three focus group discussions with a member of ten participants for each discussion. The author selected the Participants for the discussion purposefully based on age and gender. In the first focus group discussion, the researcher selected local elders who live around the Shrine for a long period to get relevant data about the tourism attraction potentials of the study area and to know the way the local population conserves the mosque of Jille Dhumuga kebele traditionally. In the second focus group discussion, the author used religious fathers and concerned government body to know deeply the conservation measures taken to protect the mosque from damage as well as the way to increase the tourist arrivals of the mosque and the way the local community was beneficiaries from their heritage as well as tourism potentials of the area.

Fieldwork and Observations
The researcher conducted fieldwork for this research to collect the necessary data. Primary data from the study area were collected through field surveys and interview with the local people. During the field survey, the researcher conducted the following activities.
• The researcher had made an interview with key informants and then takes note • Took the photograph of potential tourism sites which existed in the study area • Identified the main challenges for the development of the tourism industry in the study area. • Used written sources such as ar ticles, documents of cultural and tourism bureau of Oromo zone of Amhara region and different pamphlets and • Different materials such as papers, mobile to capture pictures and record voice, pen, meter.

Methods of Data Analysis
An analysis is done in two ways. Few and selected numerical data were organized into tables and the results were explained based on the nature of the data through Quantitative data. On the other hand, qualitative data collected through observation and interviews are analyzed by integrating it with the data collected through the review of different works of literature and documents. For this study, the researcher used both qualitative and quantitative methods as the primary means of data analysis.

Location of Tirusina Shrines
The

Historical Background of the Shrine of Tirusina
In the history of the northern part of Ethiopia, Wallo is the most important place where Islamic teaching and learning was strengthened its footsteps and the most important Islamic order known as Sufi order was strangely disseminated towards other regions of Ethiopia from this region. Wallo is well known for a large number of shrines and their central place in the history of the spread of Islam in Ethiopia as they played a very important role in serving as the first centers of Islamic learning.
Most of the inhabitants of the study area are followers of Islamic religion and most of the heritage sites in the zone are also connected to the Islamic religion. Tourism sites help to achieve economic development and play its role in poverty reduction when it was conserved and well-promoted for the public to gain economic advantage through tourism. It is important to identify potential tourism resources and it has to be the prior issues rather than focusing on the utilized destinations. From the potential tourism sites of the Oromo Zone of Amhara region, the Tirusina shrine is one.
Tirusina shrine is one of the religious places in the Oromo zone and the village is found in a Jille Dhumuga kebele, six (6)  Tourism potentials of the Jille Dhumuga village site were endowed both with natural and cultural attractions. Most of the tourism type located within the study area is largely related to religious heritage tourism. But from the available religious tourism, the Tirusina shrine is the most important one.
In the current time, the types of tourism in the study area are not restricted to the followers of only the religion of Islam but they were from different religious backgrounds as well as ethnic and economic backgrounds. Traditionally us we all know those peoples involved in religious tourism to those important heritage sites are simply called pilgrims but nowadays many non-religious individuals also embark on trips to religious heritage places because many of these sites are of cultural or historical as well as religious interest.
Tourists could impose socio-economic, environmental as well as political impact in the local community, no study efforts are made to maximize the various socio-economic environmental and political gains that can be accrued from tourism and solves the bottlenecks for the development of the tourism sector, there is a good possibility to raise the role of tourism in the overall regional and local development. According to my informant, those going to the shrine is called Ziyara. The pilgrims at the site took place twice in a year that is in August and October respectively. Peoples go to the Tirusina heritage site annually for the search of Baraka of the prominent wali or sheik. 31

Festivals and Ceremonies at Shrine of Tirusina
Some rituals take place regularly at the Tirusina shrine. These rituals are syncretistic, adopting some elements of orthodox Christianity, Islam, and traditional beliefs. These rituals attract people from different ethnic and religious backgrounds and include:

Wadaja
A weekly Wadaja (group prayer) is held on Mondays. According to historical sources, Wadaja is related to the traditional Oromo religion. 32 J. Spencer Trimingham defines it as, "the family, or communal prayer gathering". 32 The Wadaja ceremonies were varying for the people based on ages and sexes. From the attendants of Wadaja that I have seen in the Tirusina shrine, about 40 percent of the participants in Wadaja at the shrine are Christians while the rest of the participants are Muslims. The ethnic profile of participants at the Wadaja is also quite diverse. There are attendees from the Oromo, Afar, Amhara, and Argoba ethnic groups who come regularly to the shrine.

Zar hadra
The Zar hadra is a session of prayer, chanting, singing, and dancing by a group of possessed individuals seeking to appease a possessing spirit. place to place. They were nine in numbers. Each of these pots can contain three and a half jarikans. 37 They made from clay which is not far from the area.
• Drums. One can find several drums in the shrines that vary in sizes from one to another which are used during the time of mawlid and other celebrations. 38

Fig.1 : The pots (left) and drum (right) in Tirusina Shrine
In addition to the treasures of the shrine we discussed above, in the village of the Tirusina shrine, there are so many resources and constructions in the village. From the buildings within the compound, one can find circular houses which give different services. The aim of the construction of these houses is different and their services also differ from one to another. For example, there are a coffee room, kitchen room, and household materials room.
In the coffee room the only materials found within the building are traditionally made large kittles, coffee grindings, cans made of wood, cups, jabenas, makocha (mortar), a wood made 'Rekebot' which can hold more than 200s coffee cups. It is a place where coffee is gathered by the community of the area and also collected from those who need the Baraka of the sheik and come up with it during the time of mawlid (the birthday of prophet Muhamad) and other celebration in the mosque. 39 Jille Dhumuga has the potential to be one of the notable tourist destinations of the Amhara region. One would expect that there would still be the future expansion of the tourism industry in the Tirusina shrine. The above table shows the increase in the number of tourists that were visiting the study area from time to time. In addition to the increase in the number of tourists, the income that the area generated from tourists visiting the shrine was also increasing from time to time. So that from this one can understand that the income and the number of tourists have a direct relation to one another. That means when the tourists visiting the shrine increases, the income is also increasing and when the number of tourists decreases, the income is also decreasing. This is mainly because of the political instabilities in the country before the coming of the new government in Ethiopia. The Ethiopian peoples were in the state of political instability during this time and it resulted in the fall of the number of tourists and pilgrimages to the site.
The Shrines of Tirusina has importance for a religious pilgrimage to the local community as well as the pilgrimage communities from different lands to the region in the following means.
• Religiously it is believed as a place where people of different ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds gathered together for the religious pilgrims which are commonly called ziyara, a visit to the site. • Economically, the mosque is boosted when the pilgrims arrive. The pilgrims used to give different gifts for the Shrines for Baraka / blessings. In addition to the economic benefits, the shrines become a place where the different nationalities, ethnic groups, colors and religious backgrounds grouped for one aim. This helps to experience different cultural practices that increase insight and appreciation for different approaches to living. By learning more about others, the difference among people of various ethnic groups becomes less threatening and more interesting.
Generally, the specific benefits that a community can accrue through tourism are largely related to the increment of the living conditions of the community and economic growth by creating job opportunities, etc.

Challenges and Opportunities of Tourism Development In Tirusina Shrine Problems
Many problems face the development of the tourism industry in the study area but the main important constraints are the shortage of skilled manpower, lack of heritage guide and conservation professional, lack of awareness about the value of tourism site, lack of accommodation, accessibility, absence of written documents, etc.

Lack of Road Transport
Sound road transport is vital for the development of the tourism industry. The transport system creates a link between the origin of tourist and tourist destination areas. It also renders the transport service within destination areas. Most tourists have come to visit the shrine from the surrounding regions of Waldia, Kamissie, Dessie, and Bati respectively. This important Shrine can be reached by road, either in private vehicles, Bajaj or by public buses only during the time of the dry season. It is difficult to go to the site during the rainy season even on foot. The current road from Shakla town to Tirusina shrine is a recent phenomenon but it has no quality and it lacks standard and is not give safe services as it is expected from the tourist's point of view.

Absence of Standard Hotel
The absence of hotel accommodation and other tourist facilities are the major factor for the stagnation of the tourism industry in Kamissie. There are very few hotels in the capital of the zone. When we come to the Tirusina shrine, there is no place for guests to rest to host a large number of tourists. Most of the time, tourists are forced to sleep at the home of the local community. This hurts the growth of the tourism industry. The absence of adequate hotel shortened the stays of tourists.

Lack of Trained Manpower
Lack of trained manpower in the field of tourism is one major the problem of the development of tourism. Most experts in the district's culture and tourism office are graduates of either, Afaan Oromo, Amharic language, English, economics, and geography. They have never taken a course that is related to tourism. They do not know what to do to enhance the flow of tourists and how to protect the sites from damage by tourists visiting the site.

Budget Constraint
Finance has a crucial rule in the development of tourism. The budget allocated to the district cultural and tourism office is not enough to conduct its task properly. Though the budget allocated has shown an increase, it is not adequate still. The budget has increased from 32,507 in 2014 to 45,424.71 in 2015 and from 48,237 in 2016 to50, 000 in 2017. Lack of budget halts the development of tourism in the study area.

Lack of documentation and Well-Organized Information
As I already tried to explain earlier to conserve, preserve, reconstruct and promote the tourism resources of the shrine of Tirusina, there should be a trained personal and has well experienced in a field of heritage and has sufficient information about the site. In addition to the above idea due to the seasonality of the flow of tourists, tourism does not create permanent employment opportunities for the local people. The arrival of tourists has not properly documented.

Advertisement Problem
The growth and development of tourism have a great role in economic growth. Promotion enhances the flow of tourists by promoting tourist attraction sites to tourists. The promotion has played a paramount role in the development of the tourism industry and create direct and indirect employment opportunities by increasing the flow of tourists. 41 The promotion has been made in the brochure by the federal tourism and cultural bureaus twice in 2013 and 2015 respectively. During this time, they prepared pamphlets about the site and distributed for the local communities and tourists available there and puts the left in the mosque and cultural and tourism bureau of the Oromo zone of the Amhara region. 42 This is a good beginning to advertise the site but it has also its limitation because the pamphlet was written only by the Amharic language while the inhabitants of the site are the speakers of Afaan Oromo and many of the tourists are from different ethnic backgrounds, it is necessary to prepare documents written by English for international tourists.

Opportunities
The shrine of Tirusina is important for the attraction of tourists from different areas because of its potential historical, religious pilgrimage and cultural values. The tourism sector is one essential component of Ethiopia's national development and transformation. It is set in a national environment that faces tremendous opportunities such as: • The income of the shrine of Tirusina was used to conserve and protect the shrines from further damage and used to repair those that were already damaged. • At the same time, poverty, unemployment, food insecurity, and underdevelopment of the productive forces will be a decline from time to time when the study areas problems of transportation and the likes are solved because it is a source of income as a means of tourist attraction site. • The opening of a new department especially the tourism department in the university will eradicate the problem of shortage of trained manpower in the field. • In the village of Tirusina, there are no hotels and restaurants constructed until now, so in the future, the investment in the construction of new hotels will be started in the area to overcome the existing problem.

Conclusion and Recommendations Conclusion
Ethiopia is one of the countries in Africa which has a very long history on the continent. The country is bestowed by different cultural and natural tourism potentials with diverse natural scenery, culture, people, endemic fauna and flora and being home of many international and regional organizations that have potentials and serves the country a lot in terms of economic development. Among the tourist attractions and potentials found in the northern part of Ethiopia, Aksum stale, Lalibela rock-hewn churches, the castles of Gonder and the likes played a huge role in developing the country's economy in terms of tourism.
The country has potential tourist attraction sites and the countries use in terms of tourist is found in the infant stage. However, the awareness about the use of tourism resources increased from time to time starting from the 1960s. The southern part of Ethiopia is also played its lion share in terms of economic development through tourism. For example, the heritage site of the walled city of Harar, the Tiya stale, the Sofomer cave, Shrines within Dire Sheikh Hussein, and many shrines, monasteries, churches, both natural as well cultural tourist attractions of the region contributed for the development of the country's economy at large, this is not to deny the tourism resources found in every corner of the country. As per the study area of the researcher is concerned, it is found in the northern part with a specific place of Southern Wallo Zone at the district of Jille Dhumuga. The Jille Dhumuga region is endowed with various tourist attractions resources. However, the local people have not been benefited as it is expected from their tourism resources due to its underdevelopment. Lack of sound road transportation, budget constraint, lack of trained manpower, and lack of standard hotel, lack of promotion and seasonality of tourist arrivals.

Recommendations
The researcher drew the following recommendation on how to conserve and transfer the Tirusina heritage site from one generation to the other. The government should have to allocate adequate budget for the tourism sector.

Acknowledgment
The author was grateful to Oromo Zone culture and Tourism offices and all the informants in Jille Dhumuga districts especially in the village of Tirusina for their great contribution in providing invaluable oral information to overcome the challenge of sources.

Funding
No grant is provided for this article.

Conflict of Interest
The study was carried out by the author himself without any help from any organization.