By Joyce Remi- Babayeju
A legal Luminay and founder of Afe Babalola University Ado Ekiti, ABUAD, Aare Afe Babalola, SAN, has called on the National Assembly to draft a robust and strong legal framework to market and boost the tourism sector in Nigeria.
Aare Afe Babalola made this call on Wednesday when the Senior Special Assistant to the Governor of Ekiti State on Tourism Development, Mr Wale Ojo – Lanre and Team Ekiti Tourism Development visited him in his White Rock Office, Afe Babalola University, Ado Ekiti.
During the visit the team took a tour of the Afe Babalola University campus, the Multi-System Hospital, the Planetarium and ABUAD Farms all within the ambit of Afe Babalola University, Ado – Ekiti.
Aare Afe Babalola who commended Dr Kayode Fayemi ‘s tourism vision said that the key to treaping bountifully from the nation’s ourism sector is through a legal framework.
“We have a country which is overwhelmingly blessed with viable and humongous tourism wonders most in their pristine form. We have intelligent, resourceful and vibrant tourism practitioners and stakeholders who are frenetically strengthening themselves out to eke something from the tourism offerings.”
We have a world that is ready to explore Nigeria. But regrettably, we have a set of weak legislation and laws which were crafted when the tourism sector was in an analogue era, he emphasized
.
This he noted is the necessary jelly for the lubrication of a vibrant tourism economy and business in Nigeria.
He called on the public and private sectors tourism practitioners in Nigeria to synergize efforts at ensuring the enactment of a purposeful and vision-driven legal framework pointing out that the tourism sector is at present an unregulated and uncoordinated sector that is still archaic and obsolete and bears no relevance in the face of contemporary developments.
Ambassador Ojo –Lanre disclosed that his mission to ABUAD was in furtherance of Dr John Kayode Fayemi’s tourism policy of enhancement of tourism potentialities of Ekiti State.
Ojo- Lanre noted that Aare Afe Babalola is an asset of inestimable value to Ekiti State as a promoter of academic development and and an epitome of global tourism.
He said that the Afe Babalola University displays agro- tourism site with the beauty of a truly conducive academic environment which ipasses the environment as the hub of West Africa’s tourist destination.
