Salalah Festival comes to an end

Muscat: Salalah's Tourism festival has come to an end with a number of competitions, musical performances and a firework show.

Over 700,000 people have visited the Dhofar Governorate since the start of the Khareef season, as they came to enjoy the cool winds, refreshing rain and breathtaking greenery of the Khareef. Towards the end of the season, Al Marooj Ampitheater saw a number of stunning musical performances by famous Arab performers such as Tamer Hosny and Nancy Ajram.

On August 20, Egyptian singer and songwriter Tamer Hosny performed on stage to thousands of people and took the opportunity to praise the audience and the festival's organisation committee. Hosny said, "Please allow me to thank the festival's administrators for the great efforts that went into this stellar organisation and of course I would like to thank His Majesty Sultan Qaboos bin Said very much."

As of 22 August, over 709,097 people had visited Salalah from the start the Khareef season. Omanis made up the majority of the visitors at 506,126, followed by 54,770 Emiratis and 42,563 Saudis. Visitors of various Asian nationalities accounted for 54,512 visitors, according to data provided by the National Centre for Statistics and Information (NCSI).

The festival closing ceremony included the conclusion of the Al Bara'a competition and the announcement of the winners of the Omani folk songs competition.

“The competition, in which representatives of various wilayahs from across the Sultanate participated, saw the wilayah of Al Mazyoona in Dhofar take first place, followed by Dhank in Al Dhahirah and Muhadha in Al Buraimi and Bahla in Al Dakhiliyah in joint third place," according to Dhofar Municipality.

The ceremony was sponsored by HE Sheikh Salem bin Oufit Al Shanfari, Head of Dhofar Municipality. The festival committee previously noted that games, traditional Omani dance shows and the market would continue until August 31.

Regarding photography, a photograph by Adnan Daheesh in which he managed to capture an exchange between a member of the ROP and a young Omani child in traditional clothing, wowed viewers on social media. According to the Ministry of Tourism "Daheesh presented his photo of the beautiful spontaneous moment he captured to the ministry. This was in recognition for the role that the wilayah of Taqa played in this festival."