SAT, Tripberry, Golden Tulip Hotels and De Edge Hotels Partners Port Harcourt Bantaba 2017
South Africa Tourism Board, Tripberry.com, Golden Tulip Hotels and De Edge Hotels have all confirmed their partnership with Port Harcourt BANTABA 2017.
SAT which has been in the forefront of championing and encouraging intra-African tourism among countries in the continent, will be partnering with Port Harcourt BANTABA 2017. South Africa Tourism will be at Port Harcourt Bantaba to engage with travel trade professionals across the zone and also promotes South Africa as an all-season, year-round preferred tourist destination for travelers.
Tripberry.com is the online booking portal of Mayfair Travel Nigeria Limited, is one of the leading service providers in the travel industry in Nigeria, which focuses on providing optimum attention to customer needs and satisfaction.
According to Mr. Vinod Kaurani, Managing Director of Mayfair Travels Limited “Tripberry.com handles Ticketing of airlines, Assisting with seat allocation at time of reservation, subject to airline access available, Frequent Flyer management for clients and Processing Refunds, when required, as per airline regulations. At Tripberry.com, You will discover that customer satisfaction is everything.’’
The management of Golden Tulip Hotels had already expressed their readiness to welcome BANTABA Delegates into Garden City. According to Mr. Kazzeem Durosomo, General Manager of the Hotel ‘’Golden Tulip Port Harcourt Hotel is a first class, 4 star, International business hotels. It is situated in the Governmental Residential Area (G.R.A.) of Port – Harcourt, the Garden City of Nigeria. The G.R.A provides a serene and peaceful environment while offering proximity to a variety of other attractions and amenities in the area, including the Port – Harcourt Polo Club (1km) and the Genesis Cinema complex (3km) amongst others.’’
De Edge hotel, the venue for Port Harcourt BANTABA, is a 4 Star Hotel with 80 luxury rooms. According to Christine Plaatjies, the GM ‘’De Edge Hotel is a place where guests are treated like royalties. It is managed by Lac Management Consultants, a South African Hotel Management Company that provides highly skilled Hotel Management Consultants and experts. The hotel is tucked away from the very busy cosmopolitan traffic of the city and offers extensive luxury and comfort in the true tradition of De Edge hospitality. De Edge Hospitality Principles are based on its adherence to its Vision: Proactive Training Plans, Improved Security System, and Best Customer Care Standard’’
According to Mr. Ikechi Uko, Organizer, said Bantaba is a travel and tourism speed dating event that was first held at Abuja in 2011. And it was a success story. It was an opportunity for stakeholders in the industry to come together to discuss some of the salient issues affecting the sector and the way forward. With the Akwaaba annual travel fair, the foremost West African travel fair holding in Lagos, ACCRA Weizo in Ghana, the Bantaba speed dating will offer a platform for travel trade networking in the South-South & South- East region of the country this year.
BANTABA has been scheduled to hold 16th – 17th March 2017. Leading destinations in tourism such as South Africa, UAE, Kenya and Uganda are expected to come and market to local tour operators at the destination marketing event. Experts will be present to train agents on how to package in-bound and out-bound tours, there will also be an E-tourism training session with E-tourism expert and CEO eTourism Frontiers Kenya, Damian Cook, Trip advisor, Google and Facebook.
Training will cover topics; eTourism in Theory and Practice, eMarketing Strategy, Web Design, Content and Management, Analytics and Conversion Optimisation, Search Engine Marketing, Relationship Marketing, The Generation Gap- Encouraging User Generated Content; Trip advisor, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram, Managing Multimedia, Mobile and Location Based Services. Participants will be provided with materials at the training venue and certificate of attendance.
The recognition and awards for the Top 100 Hotels in Nigeria will hold at the Travellers Night Dinner at Port Harcourt BANTABA, on 16th March 2017. Top 100 Hotels in Nigeria is aimed at recognizing and celebrating hotels which have impacted positively on the growth and development of travel and tourism business in Nigeria through maintaining resilience, high quality in service delivery, excellence in operations, top class in infrastructure and steady progress in growth. It was started in 2011 by Travellers magazine.
Other awards lined up at the Event, are the Tourism Man of the year, Aviation Man of the Year, the Hospitality Personality of the Year, Travel Personality of the Year, the Hotel Man of the Year and the 3 most active Tourism State in Nigeria. Prof.Ben Ayade, Governor of Cross River State, was voted Tourism Man of the Year for sustaining the Carnival Calabar and most importantly, for improving on the offerings of the carnival with the international edition and bikers fiesta despite the economic recession.
While Mr. Allen Onyema, Managing Director of Air Peace was voted the Aviation Man of the Year for positioning Air Peace as one of leading domestic airlines in the country including its expansion drive on the Ghana route. Mr. Obinna Okezie, Managing Director of Wakanow won the Travel Personality of the Year for building the travel company to become a big African brand with branches abroad.
Other awards include Hospitality Man of the Year: Chief Nnaeto Orazuruike of The Genesis group; The 3 Most Active Tourism States in Nigeria, Cross River State, Lagos State and Osun State are to be recognised; Domino’s Pizza is to be awarded for the best Quick Service Restaurant while the Restaurant of the Year award goes to The Place. The award for the Hotel Man of the Year will be announced later. The awards and recognitions are intended to distinguish Nigerians both in government and in the private sector who have distinguished themselves in moving the travel and tourism business forward in Nigeria.