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BY: Manoah Kikekon
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| Dr. Babatunde Olaide-Mesewaku |
Dr. Babatunde Olaide-Mesewaku a tourism practitioner, author and Chairman of Institute for Tourism Professionals of Nigeria, Lagos state chapter. Has disclosed the challenges mitigating against the celebration of the diaspora festival in Badagry in a discussion with Segun Amosu the convener of Badagry Tourism Discuss and Seun Williams the initiator of Badagry From Above.
Mesewaku said on the Facebook live
discussion that authorities in Badagry have written several petitions against
him and the celebration of the diaspora festival in Badagry which had made the
State government to withheld its support for the celebration of the festival.
Question: what exactly is going on with diaspora
tourism in Badagry, what can we do differently to improve it?
"Diaspora tourism is the most important
product of tourism Badagry has been endowed with, this aspect of tourism covers
our religion, culture and environment, everything combined to form diaspora
tourism.
"This is the main tourism product that is
blessing Ghana as a country today which we have in Badagry. If we can annex the
product I’m telling you the issue of poverty in Badagry will be totally
eradicated. I can remember we started this product about 10 years ago, the diaspora
festival which was initiated in 2013 when we realised that our history is
enough to attract diasporas to Badagry.
"By the grace of God, we took it to a place
where the Lagos state government had indicated interest to be part of the programme
twice. But we are all living witnesses to what happened, I was petitioned
“they” worked against it. Ordinarily, the festival should have become something
else by now.
"During the period of the former governor
of Lagos state Akinwumi Ambode, we introduced it to him, and he accepted it,
saying this is a product the state government should develop but immediately after
we left his office, spanners were thrown into the wheel, and a lot of lies were
told against me, unfortunately, the state government withdrew its support immediately.
"Again in 2019, we presented the same
proposal to the current governor of Lagos state which he likewise supported at
first, in fact, the Lagos state government had gone ahead to set up a committee
but unfortunately, spanners were thrown onto the wheel again meanwhile this is
not coming from anywhere else than home.
"You won’t believe that "Authorities" in
Badagry wrote a petition against it that what we are celebrating is about
slavery and that it’s my family that organized it, it’s not welcome by the
communities. So you can see the problem we have and I can tell you that this diaspora
festival we are talking about has representatives from all the communities in
Badagry that form the organizing committee despite this those in power (the authorities)
are against it, which is so unfortunate.
"We were petitioned, Africa Renaissance Foundation (AREFO) was petitioned too
that it is only three festivals that are allowed to be supported by the state
government in Badagry, which are: Zangbeto festival at Ajido, Coconut festival
and the defund Black Heritage which was set up to counter diaspora festival
meanwhile it was just a caricature.
"I have been using the word “Authorities” I
will not clarify more than that, they wrote a letter to the Lagos state
governor that we shouldn’t be supported unfortunately we can all see Badagry
today, we can all see that nothing is happening in Badagry."
Question: What can we do to work things
out with the current reality?
"We usually start our preparation around
May or June but a can tell you nothing is happening currently because our
spirit is already dampened. If the “Authorities” can seat down somewhere and
had said the government of the day should not support our programme. Meanwhile,
they are the major benefactors of what comes in from the celebration of the festival.
"We are just doing it for the passion and
the love for our community, the potentials are here we can annex it to develop
and project Badagry and also to move our people out of poverty. We are going to
meet with the authorities to express how bad we felt about this, I must confess
to you most of them did it in error, they later discovered it was a fatal
mistake.
"They are our fathers we can not do without
them, we will get back to them and let them know they have to write to the
government again, to let the government know that this programme has the
support of everyone in Badagry."
Question: What are the untapped tourism
sectors in Badagry?
"If you’re seeing what I’m seeing you will
know how much Badagry is endowed and the neglect these potentials have suffered
in the past. Badagry has the potential for aquatic tourism, diaspora tourism,
Eco-tourism, cultural tourism, the Sun, sand and sea tourism and mangrove
tourism.
"These are areas I have researched and I
can see that virtually nothing has been done, all the efforts in the past have
only pointed to cultural tourism meanwhile it has not receive the efforts it
needed to grow. Probably only the diaspora tourism, which Africa Renaissance
foundation an NGO which I happened to be the president has also been initiated
in Badagry but because of some elements and misunderstanding on the part of the
people a lot has gone wrong, those that should front the drive to develop diaspora
tourism in Badagry are discouraging the spirit to drive tourism in Badagry.
"Diaspora tourism I can tell you is the
most important and valuable tourism product that Badagry can gain from. It is a
tourism sector that draws people across the world, but we have not been able to
harness this and those of us that have realised this and are ready to do
something about it have not really been encouraged but we hope that it will get
better. It’s not easy to start a project of such magnitude and not face challenges."
Question: How have you contributed to
tourism development in Badagry?
"My contributions have gone beyond Badagry
I can say it’s a state project we have been able to make the people realise the
potential of tourism and we have also indoctrinated youths in Badagry into
tourism.
"I have written books on Badagry, I’m very
deep into Badagry when it comes to culture and tourism."