NAN
The Plateau Government said on Friday it had earmarked N2 billion to resuscitate the Jos Wild Life Park.
The Commissioner for Tourism and Culture, Mr Abraham Yiljap, said this in Jos when he inspected the facilities at the park.
According to him, the present administration in the state wants to “touch tourism sector in a unique way”.
“What we have this year to tackle is that the Jos Wild Life Park is going to receive some action to the tune of N2 billion.
“What we are going to see would just be the first phase of the handling, because we require much more than that.
“We require between N7 billion and N9 billion to completely transform the Jos Wild Life Park into the kind of modern wild life park that we deserve in Plateau State.
“But, we have now set aside N2 billion for resuscitating the wild life park.
“We need to expand it; we need to modernise it to make the animals happier and healthier and to attract more people.’’
He said that facilities at the park would be upgraded and linked to the internet so that the people would access the park from any part of the world.
Yiljap also said that funds had been set aside to upgrade facilities at the Solomon Lar Amusement Park in Jos.
“Even for the Solomon Lar Amusement Park, we have N150 million that was set aside to tackle the expansion that would take care of the children’s playground, for example.
“We want the whole family to come in there. We want to secure the place for them and we want to have more facilities that would enable people to relax with their families.
“You will find that there are no parks in Plateau State that can compete with that particular park.
“Therefore, government’s intention is to pump more resources into that park, maintain it and attract the kind of clientele that would give it a higher prestige.’’
The commissioner said that the state government would take steps to reclaim parks’ lands that had been encroached upon.
He said that a stakeholders meeting would be convened to discuss the issues before any decision would be taken so that people with genuine cases would be listened to.
Earlier, the Manager of the Jos Wild Life Park, Mr Victor Damar, narrated the challenges facing the park such as trespass, vandalism of the park’s facilities, poaching and absence of some animals.
The park manager said that the Jos Wild Life Park which was established in 1972 had 62 workers.
