The Gambia Woos Nigerian Tourists, Investors at Akwaaba Travel Market – Independent Newspaper Nigeria

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The Gambia has stepped up efforts to attract more Nigerian tourists, tour operators and investors to the country, with its Minister of Tourism, Arts and Culture, Abdoulie Jobe, inviting Nigerians to explore the West African country’s beaches, culture, heritage, gastronomy and wildlife.

Jobe made the call while speaking at the 22nd Akwaaba African Travel Market held at Eko Hotel and Towers, Lagos. The three-day tourism event commenced on September 13.

The minister, who led a Gambian delegation to the event, described Nigeria and The Gambia as countries bound by strong historical, cultural and people-to-people ties, saying tourism could provide an avenue for deepening those relationships.

He said The Gambia, popularly promoted as the “Smiling Coast of Africa”, had come to the Nigerian market to showcase its tourism offerings and develop stronger commercial partnerships with Nigerian businesses.

“On behalf of the government and the people of The Gambia, I extend warm greetings to the government and the people of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, and in particular, expressing our appreciation for the warm welcome extended to our delegation,” Jobe said.

“We are proud to be here as representatives of the Smiling Coast of Africa – a destination that is blessed with peaceful and beautiful beaches, rich culture and heritage, vibrant arts and music, natural wildlife, and the warm hospitality of our people.

“Our message here is simple: we want more Nigerians to visit the Smiling Coast.”

According to him, The Gambia’s participation was not limited to promoting leisure tourism, but was also aimed at creating opportunities for businesses, investors and communities in both countries.

He said the Gambian delegation had brought tourism stakeholders to Lagos to promote the country’s diverse experiences, including beach tourism, cultural and heritage attractions, ecotourism, gastronomy, entertainment, business events and investment opportunities.

Jobe also called for closer cooperation between Gambian and Nigerian tourism businesses, particularly tour operators, airlines, hospitality companies, investors and players in the creative industry.

“We equally welcome strong partnerships with Nigerian tour operators, airlines, investors, hospitality businesses, and the creative industry,” he said.

The minister said The Gambia was committed to supporting platforms that enabled African destinations to connect, collaborate and expand their tourism markets.

He described Lagos as an important centre of tourism, culture and creativity, adding that his government looked forward to strengthening its relationship with the city and Nigeria as a whole.

Jobe also used the occasion to urge African countries to develop stronger intra-African tourism, arguing that the continent should increasingly become its own tourism marketplace.

“Africa must, if you please, increasingly become its own tourism marketplace. We must encourage citizens to travel across Africa, discover our diverse cultures and destinations, and build lasting relationships,” he said.

Extending a direct invitation to Nigerians, the minister added: “To our Nigerian brothers and sisters, we extend a warm invitation: come and discover The Gambia, come experience the Smiling Coast of Africa, come for the sun, stay for the culture, and return with our people.”

He expressed appreciation to the organisers of the Akwaaba African Travel Market, wishing the event continued success and reaffirming the importance of stronger Nigeria-Gambia relations through tourism.

During his opening remarks earlier, the Convener of Akwaaba African Travel Market, Ikechi Uko, said the event was conceived more than two decades ago to address the limited opportunities available to African tourism businesses to market their destinations and services to the wider world.

Uko, who traced the origins of the event to his experience in the travel industry, said he had observed that many young African tour operators and tourism entrepreneurs had the capacity to compete internationally but lacked platforms through which they could showcase their businesses.

“Because it gives you a very limited opportunity to expose yourself. And it was purely tourism that came, because I was in the travel business. I know there are so many young tour operators, so many people who had capacity to do, but they were limited in exposing their craft to the world,” he said.

He explained that the experience prompted him to develop the idea of creating an African platform through which Africans could market their destinations and tourism products to fellow Africans and the international market.

“So I came back, and I had the idea: we need to create something in Africa that gives Africans an opportunity to market themselves. It was a very… it was a very difficult dream to push forward,” Uko said.

He recalled attending ITB Berlin in 2004, where he presented his vision to representatives at the African stand, only to encounter doubts about the feasibility of developing intra-African tourism.

“I remember at ITB 2004, I went to the African stand and I told them, ‘I have this vision, and it is possible.’ And everybody says, ‘Nah, Africans don’t have money. Africans can’t travel within Africa,’” he recalled.

Uko said his subsequent exposure to The Gambia helped demonstrate to him that there was considerable potential for Nigerians and other Africans to travel within the continent if destinations were properly marketed and positioned.

According to him, accommodation costs in The Gambia at the time presented an opportunity for Nigerian travellers, particularly when compared with hotel prices in Lagos and other international destinations.

He recalled telling Gambian tourism stakeholders that it was possible to attract large numbers of Nigerian visitors because the country offered five-star accommodation at comparatively affordable rates.

“I told them it is possible to bring a lot of Nigerians here, because you have five-star rooms that sell for 70 to 80 dollars a night. The cheapest room in Eko Hotel then was 170 dollars. Before, South Africa was 100, then it came 150, then it came to 400. But in Gambia, you can get five-star rooms for 70, 90 dollars. And we started that process,” he said.

Uko said the vision eventually gained the support of Eko Hotel, which provided the venue for the early editions of the event without charging for the hall.

He described that support as one of the reasons he had remained closely associated with the hotel and the event over the years.

“By 2003, Eko Hotel calls me, and the GM says, ‘We support this vision.’ And we started… Eko Hotel gave us the hall for free. That’s why it’s difficult for me to leave,” he said.

According to Uko, the event has grown significantly since its establishment, attracting tourism ministers from different African countries and, at various times, presidents and senior government officials.

“And today, 22 years after, the vision is bigger than ever,” he said.

He recalled that the Nigerian Minister of Tourism attended the event in its early years and encouraged other countries to participate, after which the then Gambian Minister of Tourism also attended.

“The next year, the Minister of Tourism of Gambia came. And since then, we’ve been having ministers, we’ve had from different countries, and we’ve had presidents come to honour us,” Uko said.

Uko, however, said the event had largely been sustained by private-sector support rather than direct government funding.

He said the absence of government funding had been raised by participants from other African countries who found it difficult to understand how an event of Akwaaba’s scale could continue without substantial government backing.

“We wish we could get a lot more support from the Nigerian government, but you know in Nigeria, individuals do very well,” he said.

Uko recalled that a Zimbabwean participant had asked whether Akwaaba was being organised with financial support from the Federal Government or Lagos State Government.

“When the Zimbabwean was asking me yesterday, ‘Are you doing this with the Federal Government?’ I said no. ‘You don’t have funding from the Government of Nigeria?’ I said no. ‘Do you have a partnership with Lagos State?’ I said no. So he said, ‘How is it possible you could put this together?’”

He said the answer lay in the support received from private-sector organisations and individuals who believed in the vision of promoting African tourism.

“We’re able to put it together because of the private sector people who support this vision,” he said.

Uko also explained the thinking behind the name “Akwaaba”, which has become closely associated with the annual travel market.

He said the organisers deliberately selected an African word associated with welcome rather than using the name of one of Nigeria’s three largest ethnic groups, explaining that the objective was to make the platform broadly representative of the continent.

“Now the name Akwaaba… We chose Akwaaba because it’s the most popular welcome word in West Africa. Not just in Ghana, in Côte d’Ivoire, and a little bit in… It doesn’t belong to Ghana; it’s an Akan word,” he said.

He explained that the organisers had also adopted words from other African languages for their different tourism-related programmes and events.

“We pick African words for our different events. So, we have four regional events that have different words,” he said, citing “Banto”, “Woezor” and “Jibiti” among the names used for various initiatives.

Uko said the deliberate avoidance of Hausa, Igbo and Yoruba names was intended to ensure that the platform was not perceived as belonging to one dominant Nigerian ethnic identity.

“We make sure we don’t have Hausa, we make sure we don’t have Igbo, we make sure we don’t have Yoruba. Why? These are the three biggest of all the ethnic groups in West Africa, so they can market themselves. So, we choose small groups to identify with them, to represent Africa,” he said.

He said the concept was ultimately about using African languages and cultural identities to build a platform that represented the continent’s diversity.

“So, for those who keep asking me, ‘Why do you have this name?’ This is the vision that represents Africa,” Uko said.

The 22nd Akwaaba African Travel Market brought together tourism stakeholders, destination representatives, airlines, hospitality businesses, tour operators, government officials and other industry players from Nigeria and across Africa.

The event provided a platform for destinations such as The Gambia, Ghana and indigenous Nigerian States to promote their tourism products while seeking partnerships with businesses and travellers, at a time when African tourism stakeholders are increasingly advocating greater intra-African travel.