Argungu International Fishing Festival...Who is killing ?

Argungu International Fishing Festival...Who is killing ?

It is strange and shameful that at a time when most nations are working towards developing and promoting innovative platforms to attract tourists and boost their economic profile through upgrading local contents, the Kebbi State apparatus, organising the yearly Argungu International Fishing and Cultural Festival are busy killing the festival.

For over three years, the Governor Saidu Dakingari-led administration has not shown serious commitment to the hosting of the festival to actually maximize the full potentials of the AFF; previous postponements were for unrealistic reason(s), thereby lowering the patronage and economic activities of petty traders and other people in the state.
In 2009, the situation was so bad that stakeholders in the tourism industry, who had already listed the event as one of their preferred destination packages, were disappointed, losing their diaspora and foreign clients and tourists who had contacted them for the annual festival.
However, despite this level of embarrassment occassioned by the organisers, they did not deem it right to inform the public or even the tourism stakeholders on the development or why it was postponed.
Also in 2010, the event was called off only for the state government to claim to have flagged off a car race which had no direct impact on the socio-economic standard of the people.

For this year’s edition, there are uncomfirmed reports that the AFF, which is normally a four-day package, would be compressed to a day’s event to feature only the grand fishing, a decision, which some stakeholders had described as seriously uncoordinated and an attempt to kill the international image of the AFF.

This move, according to tourism stakeholders, is an attempt to sabotage the tourism promotion and development plans of the Federal Government in opening the local communities up to rapid development vis-à-vis creating employment and revenue generation for the people.

However, the government has promised on several occasions to make the Argungu fishing festival, a self-sustaining event through the involvement of the private sector and corporate sponsorships to boost the coordination and make it bigger; but rather, the event is losing steem and relevance by the year.

In the interest of development as well as creating a platform to better the lots of the people of the state as well as to open the rural areas to the world, Governor Dankingari should make good use of the festival by putting the right people in the festival committees to put the festival in the right perspective.
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Posted in: fishing news