Commissioner: New Five-Star Enyimba Hotels Will Upscale Abia’s Visibility in Hospitality Industry

Boniface Okoro in Umuahia

The five-star new Enyimba International Hotel Limited, Aba, which Governor Alex Otti will formally flag-off its construction on February 25, 2026, will make the Abia State visible in Nigeria’s tourism industry, the Commissioner for Information, Prince Okey Kanu, has said.

The 250-room facility would also create over 5,000 direct and indirect jobs and boost the state’s Internally-Generated Revenue (IGR), the Commissioner equally revealed.

Prince Kanu who was briefing journalists in Umuahia on the outcome of this week’s State Executive Council meeting also announced that the state was deploying Education Management and Information System (EMIS), an integrated data gathering technology, to halt indiscriminate transfer of pupils from one school to another, among other functions.

Governor Alex Otti will perform the flag-off ceremony to facilitate the renovation of the dilapidated facility and addition of new features to the new Enyimba Hotels being constructed by a global hospitality giant, the Radisson Blu Group.

He said the project was in line with the state government’s industrial transformation agenda, with particular focus on the hospitality industry.

The state government had already signed an MOU with Radisson Blu Group to manage the hotel when it is completed, Kanu said, adding, “the 250-room hotel facility will commence with an initial number of 155 rooms, and over time, be scaled up to 250 rooms.”

“When fully operational, the facility will provide about 5,500 direct and indirect jobs. The hotel project will allow the state government to drive its economic growth, boost the internally generated revenue, and provide the state with a robust presence in the Nigerian hospitality industry,” the Commissioner added.

In the education sector, Kanu said that about 36,415 persons applied for the ongoing second batch teachers’ recruitment of additional teachers, out of which 24,023 applicants have been shortlisted for the Computer-Based Test (CBT).

Last year, the state government employed 5,494 teachers, and the target for the second batch recruitment is 4,000 teachers.

 According to the Commissioner, the state government is deploying Education Management and Information System (EMIS) which integrates education data and processes at basic and secondary levels into one central data base, to “support efficient management of schools, data-driven development, and planning of measurable outcomes in schools.”

Weighing in, the Commissioner for Basic and Secondary Education, Elder Goodluck Ubochi, explained the EMIS would be deployed in gathering adequate data of pupils in basic education, saying the initiative would help in monitoring the pupils, including how they change schools, from time to time.

“This will be able to monitor the progress, the movement, because we noticed that our children move from one school to the other abruptly, anyhow, without any control.

“The Ministry will be in charge of the movement of our children from one school to the other, be it private or public. That’s what we intend to do with this,” Ubochi said.

The Commissioner used the opportunity to inform that, the time for the CBT for the second batch of teachers’ recruitment exercise would be announced soon.

The Special Adviser to the Governor on Media and Publicity, Mr. Ferdinand Ekeoma, was present at the press briefing.