Gov.Fayemi Upgrade Ikogosi Warmspring to a World Class Site

       Remi Oladoye

Dr. Kayode Fayemi Ekiti State Governor

Tourism is multidimensional, it encompasses a lot of things and that is why it is being regarded to as a money spinning venture for those who care handle it with bravery and market it for the world large, Tourism is what keeps countries like south Africa, Malaysia, Jerusalem among others keep relevant in the world market.
Nigeria is of the country that is blesses with a lot of tourism potentials, virtually every state in the country has one or two tourist site, some have more, but what has become of the site today, abandoned, neglect and a tale of past glory. Ikogosi warm spring is one of the prominent site everybody love to visit, located in Ekiti state the south-western part of Nigeria, the site has a source of warm water coming out from a rock and close to the source of the warm spring is a meeting point were another stream of cold water joined with the warm water . In spite of the economic importance of the site, the African mentality overwhelms the relevancy of the site as it was abandoned years. Sucessive government especially the civilian government that took over from the Military did not consider it a priority until Dr Kayode Fayemi came and see the need to restore the lost glory of Ikogosi.
The guild of tourism journalists recently embarked on a tour of the site where Dr Kayode Fayemi is transforming the site from a gory site to a new heaven, a site to behold and a cynosure of all eyes with the intent to serve as a source of income for the state in the subsequent. The governor is not stopping at Ikogosi, he is also making a frantic effort to torch all the tourism site in the state. There is a massive construction and rehabilitation going on in the site, the Charles presidential quarters, executives duplets and others are being put into order to meet the world standard while auditorium for conferences and receptions cinema and also been constructed for events , seminars and others, the site is designed to fit into a world class site without losing its local flavour as fresh local foods and drinks will be available all the time. In an interactive session with GTJ headed by Comrade Wale Ojo Lanre, the former Chief Press Secretary to his arch political rival Chief Segun Oni, Dr Fayemi opened up on why he decided to revamp the site , why he gave it to foreign company to manage and his plan for others tourism site in the state.
The governor started by given a background knowledge on how tourism development can be a source of revenue for a state or country if well developed, being a man that has travelled far and wide, Dr Fayemi believed there is need for Nigerians to shift attention from Oil and focused on other source of revenue drive that will positively affect the economy. According to him “ Nigeria need to look beyond oil, we have to get other means to move our economy forward, tourism is the best alternatives many countries thrive on revenue generated from tourism and that is the the driving vision.”

Explaining what the site will looks like when completed , Fayemi said, our projection is to make Ikogosi one of the best tourist site in the world, apart from the site itself we are also trying to work on the environment, create some artificial edifice to complement the site, we are putting in place a standard swimming pool, befitting accommodation that can accommodate hundreds of people at the same time, till now there is no hotel that has hundred room in the whole of Ekiti state, in the past the place use to have zoological garden but it is no more now, we are planning to bring that back too, we have also acquires thousands of hectare of land around that place , we want to have a golf field and a sporting arena with a standard pitch where super eagles and foreign teams can also trained. Assuring that the phase one of the project will be Commissioned by October, governor Fayemi also disclosed that the works is segmented into phases because of the need to achieve a standard site of his dream “ the project is about four phase, the first phase will be complete by October and we will commission it other phases will be moving on gradually and you can see we have contracted it out to a foreign company Mantis collections a south African based specialists in hotels and resort. The representatives of Mantis group is here, he is monitoring the work going on in the site because they are to run the place they are qualified to do so “ we know what we want, we cannot do it ourselves because we may not get the real quality and know that government is the worst business manager in the world, we are not there yet an any attempt to pretend as if we were there is a kiss of death to the vision “ the governor explained Dr John Dison, the General Manager of the Mantis collection said “ the location of the site make it more marketable and he promised that the site will be the best of its kind in this part of the world, the passion of the governor and his team to have a befitting tourist site in the state is highly commendable “.

Having concluded arrangement to revamp the Ikogosi warm spring, the governor also disclosed that they are looking at connecting Ipole Iloro waterfall with Ikogosi through a cable car, Ipole iloro waterfall is about four kilometre to Ikogosi, we are trying to link the site together so that people can also visit there, we are also trying to have a heliport on the site for helicopters to park . The governor said further that at this point i want to tell you that we are queuing into what my predecessor Engineer Segun Oni was trying to do, establishing the Airport, it is not that Ekiti state need airport at this moment but if we have it will complement marketing of the site”.
According to him, Ekiti state is located between the economic capital of Nigeria Lagos and    Abuja it will be easy for anybody coming from Lagos or Abuja to come here compare to Obudu and other site in Nigeria. “ We are doing this not because of Ikogosi warm spring alone but we are trying to develop other tourist site in Ekiti, the state is bless with many site Our administration is also embarking on massive construction of road because of its connectivity to the tourism development in the state, we are planning to convert the governor’s office back to Hotel, initially the place was meant for hotel but one governor just came and believe that he need a larger office that is why he converted the place to office, we are working on how to build a new governor’s office, also the old prison demolished will be made a recreational centres we have talked to Silverbird Communication to put in place a cinema” .

Governor Fayemi who however assured the GTJ that the Ikogosi project will not be made a white elephant project is no doubt an experience man who is using his international experience to develop his state ,he is not only rewriting the tourism history of the state in Gold he is passionate about rebranding Ekiti state from what it used to be to a new haven.