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The untapped gold mine in Nigerian Tourism



ALL of these countries have something in common:

Egypt (Pyramid; Nile), Kenya (Games; Nile), Greece (Ancient Ruins), Israel (Bible sites), China (Wall), USA (Grand Canyon, Rockies), Spain, France (Eiffel), Morocco (Marrakesh), Canada (Rockies), Australia (Kangaroo), German (Wall of Berlin), United Kingdom (Palaces), Saudi-Arabia (Mecca-Medina), Madagascar (Forest of knives), South Africa; Central America - Bahamas, Jamaica, Barbados, Cayman Island, St. Lucia, Virgin Island, Puerto Rico, Mexico (Beaches and exotic sites), Dubai (High towers, Real Estate), India (Medical care, IT, Taj Mahal), etc.

These are some of the best tourist destinations in the world. Some of them have a far worse security situation than Nigeria. In 2017, Morocco, our African brother saw over 11.3 million visitors; South Africa with their violent crime rates, saw 10.3 million, Egypt saw 8.3 million, Cote D'Ivoire our neighbor in West Africa saw 1.8 million. Botswana, a country of 2.3 million people entertained 1.6 million guests in 2017. Nigeria is not on the list of countries that saw up to a million visitors. Can you imagine how much a country like Morocco is making from visa fees alone if they are charging $150 per head, $1.7 billion = N610.2 billion? Each guest would spend on an average, about $1000 on Hotels, transportation (International & domestic), meal, site-seeing, souvenirs/gifts, cinema, recreations, property acquisitions, etc. That is about $11.3 billion = N4.1 trillion (this is about half of the Nigerian annual budget currently).

These countries individually make billions of dollars directly (visa and taxes from facilities, airline, local transportation) and indirectly on jobs created in several sectors - hospitality, local transportation, cinema, boutiques, fashion centers, language interpreters, hotels/Airbnb, hairstyling,

I am not sure how many Cruise ships dock on the shore of Nigeria; can you imagine what dredging of River NIger would have done to international tourism in Nigeria, with Cruise ships being able to ride inland; how Arugungu festival; Eyo festival; Osun festival; Tiv festivals; Calabar festival; Obudu range resort where you can touch the sky; Yankari game reserve; Ikogusi water Fall where cold and hot streams meet; a well organized Nollywood with the film village; Zuma rock in Abuja; the deserts of the north, coastline of the south and the flat planes of the middle belt; if we fight to repatriates a lot of stolen arts from Nigeria during the colonial era - we will have Museums of international class that will house symbols of ancient civilizations in Nigeria-Africa before the incursion of the colonial masters that truncated the normal process of growth.

The past and present the governments in Nigeria seemed to have realized this truth about the gold mine in the tourism sector, but the strategy has only worked so far. The right people need to be put in place to lead the effort to tap these resources that has the potential to surpass revenue generation from petroleum if properly harnessed.

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