Otunba Wanle Akinboboye, Founder and President of La Campagne Tropicana, Forest and Beach Resort, has never disguised his passion for his country and tourism.
Since birthing of his forest and beach resort in Ikegun Village, Ibeju Lekki axis of Lagos State, he has continued to making the resort attained the height as the most sought after and multiple-awards winning African themed resort in global tourism.
Akinboboye is fascinated by the idea of building, developing and promoting tourism products. This he has successfully accomplished over the years by creating and turning every latent tourist attractions in sight into tourism products, thereby creating destinations that not only stimulate the senses and sensibilities but offer opportunities for tourists to explore and gain immersive experience from the destinations and products created by him.
He started on this noble course in October 2023, with the unveiling of a tourism product weekly.
For him, embarking on this course is not just driven only by his nationalism and patriotic conviction but also the need to boost and uplift Nigerian tourism from its underperforming level to a thriving one.
This effort also is to create opportunity for the development of a successful tourism business and market for the country, with particular reference to the teeming young Nigerians, who are now beginning to see life in tourism by turning them into tourism entrepreneurs.
Between October and December 2023, this tourism entrepreneur of note, unveiled 12 tourism products from his repertoire for the benefit of Nigerian market.
The most important thing in this new enterprise of Akinboboye, who himself is a multiple-awards winner and Africa’s Tourism Icon, is the fact that Africa destination is his horizon, using Nigeria and Lagos in particular, as a base for reaching to the entire world.
His belief is that Africa and Nigeria should target the Diaspora market, with the aim of attracting over 50 million people yearly to the continent and Nigeria by extension, to have an immersive experience from the numerous tourism products.
Speaking further, he said, ‘‘we are not asking for handouts, we are asking them to come and take advantage of the vast opportunities in Africa.
“We are giving them open opportunities, for them to have easy connection to the entire continent that will be championed by Nigeria.
‘‘They will be using Lagos State as the gateway, being the biggest economy in Africa, and the largest concentration spot in Africa, it is the gateway to get people of African descent and lovers of Africa to connect with the continent.’’
It is in this regard that he spoke glowingly of IPADA Carnival, one of the 12 products so far released by him, which according to him, is multi-dimensional and offers opportunity for Africa to fuse into one big market for the people to harvest rich fund.
He explained that “we are targeting a minimum of 50 million people annually that will be coming to the African continent through Nigeria, taking advantage of our deep seaport at Lekki.
‘‘We are transforming slave ships to cruise ships and then luxurious airlines. Now, we are celebrating our prosperity, our resilience, our growth, our development, and our contribution to the world economy.
‘‘At the end of the year, there would be a huge harvest, a celebration of that Motherland Beckons’ Heed The Call, and a huge harvest of the celebration of heeding that call, ‘IPADA.’’
READ ALSO FROM NIGERIAN TRIBUNE
and then