September 18, (THEWILL) – The Minister of Tourism, Lola Ade-John, has met with her Transportation counterpart, Senator Sa’id Alkali, to work on modalities to improve domestic tourism in Nigeria using the rails and road infrastructure.
The minister met with Alkali to share ideas on the available transport infrastructure in Nigeria and how Nigerian tour operators can tap into the existing infrastructure to grow their business.
It was agreed that a joint committee be set up involving Nigerian tour operators, to evolve a workable framework to implement an effective domestic tourism project in the country.
Just last week, Ade-John engaged her counterpart in the Interior Ministry, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, on easing visa access for African travellers coming to Nigeria. She reached out to the Minister and the Comptroller General of Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS), Kemi Nandap, to resolve issues associated with visas on arrival. The cost of visas has been an obstacle to improved visitation of tourists.
Her advocacy has been praised by event organisers in the country. Her emerging advocacy is the next phase of engagement with the industry. She spent the first part attending tourism events all over the country to know the stakeholders and listen to them.
Lola Ade-John has attended more tourism events in one year than most tourism ministers did in 4 years. She has promised to engage other interdependent ministries and departments to ease the challenges the stakeholders face as part of their business.
Janefrances Ebere Chibuzor is a Tourism Writer at THEWILL
