A team of market destination representatives from the Uganda Tourism Board led by Anthony Ochieng, met with select journalists in Lagos to promote and market Uganda to Nigerians as the next tourism destination in East Africa. Charles Ajunwa brings excerpts

Uganda is known as Africa’s pearl, can you tell us about your mission in Nigeria?

Uganda’s size is 241 kilometres square and the population is around 50 million. It’s also known as the Pearl of Africa because of its diverse natural endowment and beauty as described by various leaders like Winston Churchill.

Uganda tourism is steadily growing. It’s a destination which we must all start watching around. Some of Africa’s most sought-after species live in Uganda, like the Big Five, with a bonus of seeing mountain gorillas and chimpanzees.

Uganda also boasts of having the source of River Nile, the longest river in the world, home to the largest freshwater lake in Africa, you all know Lake Victoria. It has a diverse culture, amongst many other things, music festivals and many others.

Eleven per cent of the world’s bird species, including rarely seen birds like the shoebill, are found in Uganda. Uganda’s mice hub is slowly growing. It is now becoming a force to reckon with in terms of mice destination.

We’ve also got physical features like the Rwenzori Mountain, which is over 5,000 feet above sea level. It’s a very tough hiking destination. And tourism is also one of the major sectors that contributes enormously to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Uganda.

Now why Uganda? There are so many things you can experience in Uganda. One of them is the nightlife. You can bar hop. There are various attractions you can visit in Kampala.

There are some festivals which have been conducted in Kampala, like Kampala Fashion Week, Afropolaza, etc.

Now, one of the things that we are targeting so much about this market is faith-based tourism. Under faith-based tourism, we are talking about the different denominations. And you know Uganda hosts the Namugongo Shrine. How many have heard of Namugongo Shrine? The Uganda Martyrs. From statistics, Catholics and Anglicans make the major religious stakeholders in Uganda.

In the past, we’ve also had pilgrims travelling to Uganda to experience the Uganda Martyrs celebration, which usually takes place on the 3rd of June. This year, we still do not have the statistics, but there was a sizable number of Ugandan Catholics who visited Namugongo on the 3rd of June.