Mr Kehinde Alabi, a tourism practitioner on
Thursday in Abuja urged the Federal Government to make tourism-friendly
policies to enhance the growth of the sector.

Alabi told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN)
that the country was blessed with enormous tourism potentials that needed good
policies for proper development.

He said the historical and cultural heritage
of tourism was traceable to local communities, hence the need for deliberate
policies that would grow the sector.

“For adequate development of tourism in
Nigeria, there is the need for government to make deliberate policies that are
favourable to the local communities and the private sector that are custodians
of our history and heritage,” he said.

He said that the provision of stable
electricity, access to soft loans and good roads were essential to the
development of the sector.

Mrs Grace Sunday, an operator of Golden
Garden in Garki, Abuja, said that inconsistency in government policies were
major setback to the sector.

She said that some major problems were
multiple taxation, the lack of proper guidelines for parks operations and the
lack of sincerity on the part of governments.

She said that the various governments were
not sincere in the development of the sector because “every policy we have now
is anti-business”.

“As a park owner, I pay more than three
taxes and other bills that are not encouraging people to come into business.

“I cannot break even with the different
bills I pay. We have had meetings with some government organisations stating
our stand and the need to make favourable policies, but all to no avail,”she
said.

Onofiok
Ekong, a tourism expert, said that for the sector to develop, there was the
need for government to make soft loans available for small businesses in the
sector.