By Abibat Aliu
22 Hospitality Ltd, a fully owned subsidiary of NIPCO Plc, has announced the acquisition of a majority stake in Capital Hotels Plc, owners of Abuja Sheraton Hotel.
According to the firm, the deal is part of the concerted efforts of the integrated downstream operator to diversify into the nation’s hospitality industry.
Group Executive Director of NIPCO Plc, Aminu Abdulkadir, stated that the new investors are now desirous to restore the hotel to its former glory and to reposition it as the first-choice luxury hotel in Abuja.
The hotel is currently managed by Starwood/Marriott under various system license agreements with CHP.
In the past, Starwood had acknowledged in various reports that the hotel was ‘in a much-degraded state and will require hard renovations’ to make it brand compliant. However, despite the hotel’s poor condition and non-compliance with its brand standards, Marriott/Starwood has continued to manage the Sheraton Abuja Hotel which is now in a dilapidated and deplorable state.
Meanwhile, the new investors are keen to turn around the fortunes of the hotel through the injection of substantial new capital under certain preconditions.
Further, as part of the new investors’ commitment to manpower development in the hospitality industry, NIPCO has explained its readiness to establish a ‘Hospitality Academy’ in Nigeria in collaboration with the Federal Government to train the Nigerian youths in the various hospitality skill sets.
This initiative is borne out of the current global shortage of trained and experienced hospitality manpower. Indeed, the statistics show that there are currently more than one million job vacancies in housekeeping, waiters, chefs, security, IT, and maintenance.
The CHP Hospitality Academy will not only train Nigerians for local employment but will also equip them with the requisite expertise to seek overseas placements to fill the large volume of vacancies in other parts of the world, thereby becoming a veritable resource in the quest to abate unemployment in Nigeria.
