The fortune of one of Nigeria’s national parks is bound to be over turned by an indigenous private firm which is set to provide lush fund to help refurbish the country’s cultural and national heritage.
The firm, T.Y Holdings, BusinessDay learnt, is about to rejuvenate the park by providing infrastructure, protection and needed capacity to make the park a major attraction for tourists.
Though the modalities for the investment remain unclear, a close source, who knows about the deal, claim the invest ment should start proper in June 2015 as modalities are currently been discussed.
The park, which is Nigeria’s largest conservation enclave with a land area of 6, 731 square kilometres, has been striving to keep up with the realities of a modern national park and tourists’ demand but the lack of essential infrastructure and amenities have perpetually failed these attempts.
Bedeviled by a series of challenges, including but not limited to heavy poaching, habitat degradation, infrastructure decay, grazing as well as managerial and administrative constraints including weak human and technical capacity and poor funding, the park has witnessed low patronage from tourists.
Justifying the new partnership, Haruna Abubakar, conservator-general of Nigeria, during a two-day workshop organised for stakeholders on private sector participation in national parks in Nigeria, stressed that though the Nigerian national parks are under the exclusive legislative list and managed by the Federal Government through the National Parks Service, the law governing the national parks service is open to private sector participation to boost eco-tourism in national parks.
ODINAKA Mbonu
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