Gloria Odion, Reporter 

The Nigeria Association of Tour Operators (NATOP) marked the 2026 World Tourism Day with a multi-zone celebration across the country, combining professional training, technology, destination marketing, tourism awareness and domestic tourism promotion.

In the South-West, nearly 200 tour operators converged on Ziba Beach Resort, Lagos, where the association turned the World Tourism Day celebration into a practical classroom on the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and digital tools to transform tour operations and destination marketing.

The Federal Capital Territory and Northern Zone, in collaboration with Naija Adventurers, organised a Tourism Awareness Walk and hike to the Centre of Nigeria, while the South-South Zone celebrated with a destination tour designed to promote tourism attractions within the region.

The activities were organised in line with the 2026 World Tourism Day theme, “Digital Agenda and Artificial Intelligence to Redesign Tourism.”

Speaking during the South-West celebration in Lagos, NATOP President, Hajia Bolaji Mustapha, said the decision to combine the annual celebration with professional training was aimed at equipping tour operators with the knowledge and digital skills required to remain competitive in a rapidly changing tourism industry.

According to her, the training was designed to teach operators how to deploy AI and other digital tools to promote destinations, create compelling tourism content and grow their businesses.

“We follow the theme and blend it with the current situation. Let’s do the training so that we attach it to World Tourism Day, with the theme, and make sure that we have achieved something while also celebrating,” she said.

Mustapha said the training would help tour operators produce better digital content and use AI to tell compelling stories about Nigerian destinations.

She stressed that operators needed to embrace the digital revolution rather than allow emerging content creators to take over a space traditionally occupied by professional tour operators.

“As tour operators who are willing to tell the good story of Nigeria, we need to bring ourselves up to speed and align with the digital revolution. Let everybody go digital,” she said.

“We also see content creators taking our business, so we want to align with what they do.

“We are the ones who understand the business, and we will be able to tell the story better, so that anybody coming to Nigeria will be able to discover Nigeria with the experts.”

Why Ziba Beach Resort

Explaining the choice of Ziba Beach Resort as the venue, the NATOP President said the association deliberately links its World Tourism Day activities to tourism destinations in order to expose members to facilities and attractions they can subsequently market to tourists.

She said the resort was particularly suitable because of its location and recent expansion, including the launch of its third phase.

“We always attach World Tourism Day to a tourism site. If you look at this whole area and this community, that’s why we see that Ziba is a tourism site. We want to explore it and, of course, the resort has newly launched its third phase.

“We will use this opportunity to look at their rooms, look at how we can sell this destination, and showcase it as a resort that is actually in Nigeria, not Zanzibar. By using the place, we would kill two birds with one stone,” she said.

The operators subsequently embarked on a facility tour of the resort, assessing its accommodation, recreational and other tourism offerings from the perspective of how they could be packaged and marketed to visitors.

Training critical to industry growth

Also speaking, NATOP Vice President, South-West, and Chairman of the zone’s World Tourism Day Organising Committee, Mrs Wonuola Olatunde-Lamidi, said the training was necessary because many operators still lacked adequate knowledge of the fundamentals of tour operation.

She particularly identified tour-package development as an area where some operators needed stronger professional capacity.

“Many don’t understand the foundation of what it is to create a tour package. And when you have people that are not well-trained in an industry, the industry will not grow,” she said.

Olatunde-Lamidi, who said she had spent 16 years in the industry and co-runs Diamonds and Pearls Travels with her husband, explained that professional competence and effective destination marketing could significantly influence where tourists choose to visit.

She said her company had evolved from being perceived merely as a travel agency into a Destination Management Company (DMC) and a trusted tourism brand through deliberate destination promotion.

“We have become a company that, when we talk about a destination, people want to go to that destination because of how we have portrayed the destination,” she said.

According to her, tour operators have considerable influence over destination choices because of their ability to package, market and communicate the attractions and benefits of particular destinations.

“You may not realise that, as tour operators, you can actually decide where people go. You can make people go to a particular destination by marketing it, by letting them know the benefits of that destination,” she said.

The World Tourism Day programme therefore combined learning with leisure, as participants had the opportunity to tour Ziba Beach Resort, inspect its facilities and unwind as part of the celebration.

For NATOP, the 2026 celebration provided an opportunity not only to commemorate World Tourism Day but also to reinforce the need for professional capacity development, digital transformation and stronger destination storytelling as tools for growing Nigeria’s tourism industry.

Gloria Odion, Maritime reporter 

Residents, motorists, port workers and business owners along Marine Road, off Liverpool Road in Apapa, Lagos, have raised the alarm over the rapid deterioration of the road, warning that its continued collapse could trigger a humanitarian, traffic and commercial crisis within Nigeria’s busiest port corridor.

The road, a critical access route serving residential communities, commercial establishments and port users, has developed extensive cracks and deep structural fissures, with large sections of the asphalt visibly sinking and showing signs of imminent failure.

A visit to the area revealed a disturbing scene of widening cracks stretching across the carriageway, while portions of the road have caved in, creating dangerous cavities that now threaten both motorists and pedestrians.

To avert accidents, residents have improvised temporary safety measures by placing concrete traffic drums and caution tapes around the failed sections.

However, they said these makeshift barriers offer little protection, especially at night when visibility is poor.

The situation has heightened fears that the continuous movement of heavy-duty trucks and articulated vehicles serving the ports could accelerate the road’s collapse.

Residents warned that if urgent intervention is not undertaken, Marine Road could become completely impassable, cutting off access to residential estates, business premises and key transport links along the Liverpool Road corridor, while worsening Apapa’s already notorious traffic congestion.

Beyond the safety concerns, the deteriorating road is disrupting daily economic activities.

Motorists are forced to manoeuvre around the failed sections, causing delays, while pedestrians navigate dangerously close to the collapsing edges.

Many residents attributed the worsening condition to recent heavy rainfall, noting that the cracks have expanded significantly, an indication that the underlying structure may have suffered extensive damage.

“This is no longer an ordinary pothole. The road is collapsing before our eyes. The cracks become wider every day, and everyone using this road fears the worst.

“If nothing is done urgently, we are simply waiting for a disaster,” one resident lamented.

Another commuter described the failed section as “a ticking time bomb,” warning that the weight of a heavily loaded truck or another bout of prolonged rainfall could trigger a complete collapse.

The worsening condition of Marine Road has also raised concerns about the potential impact on commercial activities within the Apapa port environment.

As one of the strategic access roads in the area, any disruption could impede the movement of cargo, workers and businesses that depend on the corridor.

Stakeholders have therefore appealed to the Apapa Local Government, the Lagos State Government, the Lagos State Ministry of Works and Infrastructure, and other relevant agencies to immediately conduct a comprehensive structural assessment of the damaged section and commence emergency reconstruction.

They argued that proactive intervention would not only safeguard lives and property but also prevent a more expensive and disruptive infrastructure failure with far-reaching economic consequences.

The residents further urged emergency management agencies to strengthen safety measures around the affected section pending permanent repairs.

For those who live and work along Marine Road, the consensus is clear: every day of delay increases the likelihood of a catastrophic collapse.

With the road surface continuing to sink and visible cracks widening by the day, they insist that immediate government intervention is imperative to avert what they describe as a looming disaster.