Andrew Iro Okungbowa 
…says goal’s to sell Nigerian tourism through eyes of tourist destinations
The Minister of Arts, Culture, Tourism and the Creative Economy, Hannatu Musawa, was recently at Ikogosi Warm Springs Resort and Conference Centre, Ekiti State, where she commissioned the Presidential Villa of the resort among other engagements. She fielded questions from reporters at the event on issues relating to her visit and her ministry’s agenda. ANDREW IRO OKUNGBOWA captures some of her thoughts.
Her impression of the resort
My mind is completely blown away. I have heard of Ikogosi and I have heard of the magical, and mystical sort of experience and feelings that you have in Ikogosi. But I think that as much as anyone tries to tell you, you don’t really have that full experience of what it is like in Ikogosi until you come here.
I didn’t believe that there is anywhere in Nigeria that has this kind of magic. That is really the word to encapsulate it. This place is magical.
The new Presidential Villa that we just commissioned now, I mean, anywhere you go in the world, this is what you are going to find. And what I noticed all round is the attention to details of Cavista Holdings and all the people placed here to ensure that they deliver something that is completely of global standard.
We all know that Nigeria has so many very beautiful tourism assets but I think what you have done here in Ikogosi has raised the bar in terms of what Nigeria has to offer.
We would have to ensure that Ikogosi is not only maintained but upscaled and is sustained for the benefit of not only Ekiti State, not only of the tourism industry but Nigeria as a whole.
Master plan for promoting domestic tourism
I think the best thing to really add to the template of promoting tourism in Nigeria is to focus on domestic tourism. There are so many Nigerians, from north, south, east and west, that want to experience Nigeria and everywhere you go in Nigeria is something different.
One of the initiatives of my Ministry is that it is has come up with the Renewed Hope Culture and Tourism programmes that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has asked us to put up in every single state.
He wants every single state to tell the story of their unique peculiarities through the eyes of culture, through the eyes of tourism and through the eyes of creativity.
So what we have done as a federal government is to try to reach out and do a handshake with every single state. So every single state will tell us what they want us to collaborate on that we would build on that tourism asset, and my hope is that we would now use that as a template to ensure that there is domestic tourism and that every state will have something to build on.
Ikogosi Resort as a standard bearer
I think what they have done here in Ikogosi Resort is really a template that can be used all over the country because what has been done here is something that can be done anywhere in the developed world.
I must say that one of the greatest things that they have done in terms of job creation is to engage the local community and that is very empowering because when you engage the local community you give them a sense of ownership of that edifice that you have created.
In terms of ownership, they would also want to protect it and so in the area of insecurity you are able to mitigate that in one way or the other.
Partnership with the private sector
Our Ministry is very intentional in terms of working with the private sector. This is the intention of Mr President because he wants everything to be sustained in the long term. So, he has asked every one of us to work with the private sector to ensure that we put up the right infrastructure.
What we are going to do here in Ikogosi is to try to work with Cavista Holdings to see how we can really bring traffic to Ikogosi Resort, so that we can not only maintain it and sustain it but we can continue to upscale it.
Creating access to the resort
First of all, you are right, we did come in through Akure and I tell you that I enjoyed the drive because I had the experience of watching the localities and the different communities. I, personally, loved that I have to drive along to get here. But in order for us to be able to deliver destinations such as Ikogosi, as a holistic tourist destination, not only for domestic tourism, but what I hope will be for global tourism as well, is to ensure that we put up that infrastructure and when you talk about infrastructure, access has got to be one of the maintain discussions.
I have already started discussions with the state government and of course, other MDAs, inter-ministerial collaboration, so that we ensure that access to Ikogosi is a lot easier. When you are coming in from Lagos you are able to fly directly into Ado Ekiti and then you are able to drive down here.
Again, it is really about partnership and collaborations, conversations with other MDAs to ensure that everybody pulls his weight to deliver that destination. This is what I planned to intentionally do with Ikogosi.
Nobody has to go out of Nigeria, if you want to go for a retreat, if you want to experience the beauty of nature and I think that is the magic and mystic thing about Ikogosi. That attention to details that we have seen has meant a sort of rallying point with nature and this beauty that you see here is something that we really want to deliver for domestic tourism and for international tourism.
Selling Nigeria through the eyes of tourist destinations
What as a Ministry we want to adopt is to sell Nigerian tourism through the eyes of specific tourist destinations. For example, when you are going to Cancun, you go to Cancun and you are not necessarily going to Mexico. So, before we sell Nigeria as a tourist destination you have to be able to sell to the global community Ikogosi as a destination in itself and you will find out that traffic will come into Ikogosi and as a result of that we are able to boost the traffic.
So I want to thank Mr President because of his prompting and the mandate that he gave me to ensure that we deliver these tourist destinations, and Ikogosi Resort is really at the top of my intention in terms of delivering one of those first destinations to the global community.
Projected contribution from tourism to the nation’s gross domestic product
In terms of Internally Revenue Generation (IGR generation) or contribution of tourism to the national economy or domestic gross product (GDP) of the country, I think it is going to be quite a lot because one of the things that Mr President wants us to do is to use the Ministry: Number one, have an economic expansion. That is, add to the economic growth of the nation and with the huge potential in the culture and tourism and creative sectors, we feel that we can do that.
Mr President is also looking to see that we can add job creation to it. So we are working together with Big Win and others to do a complete deep dig and a proper academy research as to what we believe the tourism sector can really contribute to the nation by 2030.
From the creative side, we feel that we can at least contribute $100 billion if all the modalities are put in place and every single sector is able to pull its weight in terms of putting the right framework in place.
I think we can even get higher numbers for that if we are able to put in place these structures and infrastructure I speak of in the tourism sector, using different destinations.
So, I think by 2027, at least with Ikogois Resort, you are going to see an upscale because of the partnership that we are having together with Cavista Holdings, with the state government and with this Renewed Hope cultural tourism and creative project that the President has mandated to ensure that we are able to contribute to the growth of the economy through the tourism sector.
I have to say that my hope is that we are going to have the National Tourism Summit hosted here with the Nigerian Economic Summit Group (NESG). My hope is to encourage every single government body to do their retreats here.
I think we, as a Ministry, are going to be very dogged and intentional in ensuring that we continue to encourage not only the private sector but different sectors in Nigeria and the governments to patronise the resort and to ensure that they also experience the beautiful warm and cold springs as well as the magic of Ikogosi
Destination 2030
Destination 2023 is one of the eight initiatives that we have in the Ministry where we want to reposition Nigeria in the eyes of the world. We want to use our culture, creative and tourism assets, because that is really where the interest in Nigeria is. It is that content.
When you talk about our content – the beautiful landscapes and just seeing the beauty of nature in Nigeria, add to that content the people of Nigeria. So, we want to use that to change the mind set of people. It is the soft power and that is where our power lies.
So we want to use that to change the mindset of the global community towards Nigeria. Part of that journey is to use a destination such as Ikogosi Resort as a rallying point to bring people into Nigeria so that they can experience and change their mind as to who we are as a people.
