By Dipo Olowookere
Last Thursday, major players in the travel industry in Nigeria were recognised at a ceremony put together by Africa’s leading online travel agency, Jumia Travel.
The event was the second edition of the Nigeria Travel Awards, which was marked with pomp and pageantry.
The awards aimed at celebrating hoteliers, airlines and travel websites for their contributions to the success of the travel, hospitality and tourism industries in 2017, as well as to encourage provision of improved quality services to Nigerians.
Managing Director of Jumia Travel Nigeria, Omolara Adagunodo, in her welcome address, explained that, “The objective of the awards event is to recognise the good work that different players within the travel & tourism industry are putting in to ensure customers are satisfied.
“As you know, our mission is to democratize travel in Africa because we believe travel makes better people and stronger business.
“To achieve this, we want to make travelling safer, easier, and more enjoyable for everyone at every budget.”
Similarly, Director-General of the Nigeria Tourism Development Commission (NTDC), Mr Folarin Coker, called on Nigerians to promote domestic tourism by looking inwards and growing the nation’s tourism policy to enable the sector realize its full potentials.
He stressed in his keynote address that, “To make tourism attractive, certain steps must be taken.”
He listed these steps as reviewing laws that don’t go along with recent trends in the industry; training personnel to understand how the industry works; putting infrastructure of tourism in place by investing in tourism assets; producing tourism events to international standard and doing away with bureaucratic bottlenecks that hinder access to finance meant for promoting tourism in the country.
The 2017 African Travel Awards winners Citiheight Hotel emerging Jumia Travel Booking Award 2017, Epe Resorts as Travellers’ Choice Award 2017, Golden Tulip Festac as Best Leisure Hotel in Lagos 2017, and Eko Hotel & Suites as Best Business Hotel in Lagos 2017.
Others were Air Peace as Favourite Local Airline 2017, Emirates as Favourite International Airline 2017, and Irin Ajo as Best Travel Blog/Website in Lagos 2017.
The inaugural awards held in 2016 ascertained Jumia Travel’s commitment to keep bettering the travel experience in Africa, positioning the awards ceremony as a key event in the travel and tourism sector in each country.
This year, they were simultaneously held in 8 other African cities including Nairobi, Algiers, Dakar, Abidjan, Accra, Douala, Dar Es Salaam, and Kampala.
