President, Federation of Tourism Association of Nigeria (FTAN), Nkereuwem Onung, a private association of tourism operators in Nigeria, has called for a separate ministry of culture and tourism in the country.
Onung spoke at the sixth edition of the National Tourism Transport Summit & Expo organized by the Institute of Tourism Practitioners of Nigeria (ITPN).
He said the reason Nigeria’s tourism is underdeveloped, and much less inclined towards the current global trend of sustainable tourism lies with the fact that the current ministry of information and culture is focused on information to the detriment of the tourism industry.
“It is not that the ministers they have given to us in tourism are bad. They are just preoccupied with information, that is why we need our own ministry of tourism and culture, so we can concentrate on issues of policies, development infrastructure, network with the states, empower the MDAs to be able to stand on their mandates because without strong institutions tourism cannot profit anyone. This is a huge platform.”
The FTAN President said Nigeria is missing out of major global tourism events unlike the Obasanjo administration which established the Presidential Council on Tourism (PCT), an eight federal ministries platform dedicated to the making tourism practice effective.
“The Presidential Council of Tourism is where the president is supposed to be the chairman to integrate all that the ITPN is doing.”
On how the ITPN annual inter-ministerial platform has impacted the tourism sector, he said, “It takes a lot to have an inter-ministerial conference with the private sector. For ITPN to put four ministries on board and create an inter-ministerial is a huge achievement. We need this level of collaboration with the private sector. That is why I said we have the power, the resources, the competence in private sector to drive to tourism in Nigeria but this is the platform we need,” concluded Onung.
