Business | Tourism
Nigeria unveils plans for $358m super resort
Nigeria launched a business and leisure resort to lure tourists with duty-free shopping and investors from Africa and beyond with tax breaks.
- Reuters
- Published: 00:00 April 4, 2007
Tinapa, Nigeria: Nigeria launched a business and leisure resort to lure tourists with duty-free shopping and investors from Africa and beyond with tax breaks.
The Tinapa resort, located on the bank of the Calabar River in the lush southeastern state of Cross River, is an ambitious attempt to develop tourism in a country saddled with a reputation for crime, corruption and poor infrastructure.
Investment in Tinapa has reached 46 billion naira ($358 million) so far, of which 10 billion came from the Cross River State government and the rest from private firms including leading Nigerian banks UBA and First Bank.
President Olusegun Obasanjo and Cross River State Governor Donald Duke were due to commission the first phase of the project, which includes four shopping malls, film studios, a casino, a cinema and an artificial lake for leisure activities.
South Africa's biggest supermarket chain, Shoprite, and top cell phone operator, MTN, have already opened stores at Tinapa as have other telecom firms and clothing retailers.
The three-phase project, powered by its own small generating plant to avoid constant power cuts that affect the rest of Nigeria, is expected to be completed in four years, said Duke's chief press secretary Joseph Ushigiale.
"We want to attract Nigerian as well as foreign investors, including world brands. ... When it is completed we expect Tinapa to attract three million tourists every year," he said.
Tinapa, which hopes to attract both private tourists and business conferences, is a free-trade zone in which investors are exempt from tax and goods are sold duty free to the public.
The nearest airport is at Calabar, the state capital, which is currently served by Nigerian airlines operating domestic flights from Lagos and Abuja.
International tourism is almost non-existent in Nigeria, Africa's most populous country and biggest exporter of crude oil.
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