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Nigerians, and indeed, the world are now anxious over the state of the health of President Muhammadu Buhari who has been out of public view in past few days because of his undisclosed ailment which is now a topic for public debate while governance suffers
| By Olu Ojewale | May 15, 2017 @ 01:00 GMT |
NOBODY needs to inform Nigerians that President Muhammadu Buhari is ill. Since Buhari returned from 49 days of medical vacation in Britain on March 10, his state of health has been a source of concern for Nigerians. More so because he said he was due to return to Britain for more treatment in about four weeks after returning to the country. But he is yet to do so.
Invariably, the concern about his state of health has now assumed a worrisome stage as Buhari has remained out of public glare in past three weeks, thereby creating some speculations in the media about his health situation. The Presidency in its wisdom has tactically allowed the speculations to heighten, refusing to give information about his health condition, which has continued to fuel speculation that probably the president has become incapacitated as being touted in the social media.
As if to add fuel to the raging inferno, the president has not attended the last three Federal Executive Council, FEC, meetings. Not unexpectedly, Lai Mohammed, minister of Information and Culture, on Wednesday, May 3, tried to play down the president’s absence from the FEC when he was confronted by the press at the State House, saying it was not a strange development as suggested by the media. Rather, he said the president was merely following the advice of his doctors that he should take things easy.
The minister stated, “All he (the president) is doing is he is following his doctor’s advice. Mr. President himself told the nation he has never been this sick and he is going to take it easy. He said it from day one when he came back from the UK. So, whatever is happening today is not any strange development; it is exactly what he said he has been advised to take it easy by his doctors and that he will soon also go back for further treatment. So, I don’t think it is anything that is out of place from what he said. He has been quite transparent and upfront in the matter concerning his health.”
Mohammed also faulted a media report which claimed that Buhari was being fed through tube, describing the report as “absolute untrue.” He said: “It is absolutely untrue that he is being fed. He was in the office yesterday (Tuesday) as you all reported. You are aware that the president was at his office yesterday (Tuesday, May 2), and he worked at his office yesterday. A few days before now, we came out to say he has been asked to take some rest by his doctors, and he chose today to rest and not to attend the Federal Executive Council meeting.”
Aisha Buhari, wife of the president, on Tuesday, May 2, tried to allay the fear of the Nigerian public by saying that her husband’s health was not as bad as some people had made people to believe. Mrs. Buhari said this in a message on @aishambuhari, her official Twitter handle, and Aisha Muhammadu Buhari, her Facebook page, on Tuesday, May 2. She said her husband had continued to carry out his constitutional responsibilities as the president without hindrance.
She wrote: “I thank all Nigerians for their concern, love and prayers over my husband’s health status. I wish to inform everyone that his health is not as bad as it’s being perceived. Meanwhile, he continues to carry out his responsibilities during this period. As it may come to your notice, he is meeting with Minister of Justice and GMD of NNPC this evening (Tuesday, May 2).”
Indeed, three weeks ago, exactly on Wednesday, April 26, Buhari informed the FEC and nation that he would henceforth be working from home. That should have settled it. But concern in the political circles is something that cannot be wished away as some of those who are regarded as being very close to the president appeared to worried about his health condition.
Apparently irked by the disturbing situation, three former Nigerian heads of state on Monday, May 1, held a closed-door crucial meeting at a residence of one of them in Minna, Niger State. The meeting which held in secret had in attendance Olusegun Obasanjo, Ibrahim Babangida and Abdulsalami Abubakar, all retired generals. Although agenda of the meeting was not disclosed, there were speculations that the meeting was held to discuss issues connecting to Buhari’s health.
According to Leadership newspaper, the meeting which lasted for more than two hours was held at the hilltop home of Babangida, a former military president. It was learnt that visitors who usually besiege Babangida’s house were streamlined, with some of them stopped from entering the house ahead of the arrival of former President Obasanjo at about 3:00pm on the day. The newspaper reported that on arrival, Governor Abubakar Sani Bello of Niger State received Obasanjo at Minna airport and took him to IBB’s home at hill top without official retinue. President Buhari’s health is speculated to be one of the issues discussed by the former leaders. The three elder statesmen reportedly met for more than two hours before Obasanjo left the state at about 6:00pm.
Details of the meeting were yet to be made public at press time, thereby making Nigerians skeptical about what role the former leaders are really trying to play in the current situation.
In any case, nobody would need to probe to know the mind of Bisi Akande, former interim national leader of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, as he blew the whistle on the health Buhari with a strident warning. On Monday, May 1, Akande has raised the alarm that some persons with political interests within the corridor of power were exploiting Buhari’s health concern to cause confusion in the country.
Nevertheless, the former Osun State governor urged Nigerians to pray fervently for the president’s health, saying the health of the leader is intertwined with the health of the nation.
The APC leader pointed out two challenges facing the country at the moment. The first, he said, and most critical being the health of the president, which he described as an unfortunate development that is beyond Buhari’s control. He said the second challenge was “the disorder and lack of cohesion between the National Assembly and the Presidency.”
In the statement he issued on Monday, May 1, Akande said: “These are two great red flag dangers that have the potential of plunging the country into unprecedented chaos and of destabilising the gains of democracy since 1999.
“The greatest danger, however, is for political interests at the corridor of power attempting to feast on the health of Mr President in a dangerous manner that may aggravate the problems between the Executive and the National Assembly without realising if, in the end, it could drag the entire country into avoidable doom.
“As delicately fragile the Union of nations making up Nigeria, so delicately fragile the democracy and the rule of laws governing the polity of the Union called Nigerian Federation. Certain Nigerian leaders, having been blindfolded by corruption, assume the possibility of using money in manipulating the national security agencies to intimidate, suppress and hold down certain ethnic nationalities or playing one ethnic nationality against the other with a view to undermining the constitution and perversely upturning the rule of law.
“To avoid the ugly consequences of letting President Buhari’s ailments throw Nigeria into confusion, I am urging all Nigerians to begin to pray for his divine healing and perfect recovery.” Akande warned those hoping to harvest political gains out of the health of the president to desist, adding that they would making a huge mistake.
He continued: “This is not Nigeria of 1993. We are in a new national and global era of constitutionalism and order. We hope Nigerians have enough patience to learn from history. My greatest fear, however, is that the country should not be allowed to slide into anarchy and disorder of a monumental proportion. The health of the leader is intricately intertwined with the health of the nation. It is more so in a delicately fragile union of nations called Nigeria”.
Expressing his feeling about the president’s health, Akande said: “I did not see President Buhari at the wedding of his grandson in Kaduna last Saturday. I was sad and I wept. When last we met at the wedding of his daughter in Abuja last December, I complained to him that I was not happy about his stressful looks.
“His reply connoted some allusions to circumstances where an honest man fighting corruption is surrounded mostly by unpatriotic greedy ruling class. He felt painfully frustrated. He assured me he would soon be going on vacation. I then knew that corruption has effectively been fighting back. And I prayed for Nigeria. That was why Ashiwaju Bola Tinubu and I rushed to meet him in London in February this year when he was sick and could not return as scheduled from his vacation. The rest is history but we must appreciate that his poor health is already taking a toll on the health of Nigeria as a polity.”
Similarly, Femi Falana, SAN, a human rights lawyer in Lagos, and seven organisations called on Buhari to heed the advice of his London doctors to take further vacation to attend to his health issue. Falana and the groups, in a statement jointly signed by them on Monday, May 1, expressed their concern about the president’s health issue.
It has also been observed that the president’s absence at the last three FEC meetings and Friday’s Jumat services was a confirmation that his health was deteriorating contrary to the claim by his wife and government officials.
Those who signed the statement along with Falana were Adetokunbo Mumumi, executive director, Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project; Debo Adeniran, executive chairman, Coalition Against Corrupt Leaders; Olanrewaju Suraj, chairman, Civil Society Network Against Corruption; Shina Odugbemi, programme manager, Democracy Vanguard; Awwal Rafsanjani, executive director, Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre; and Mohammed Attah, national coordinator, Procurement Observation and Advocacy Initiative.
Others who signed the statement were Chris Kwaja, director, Centre for Information Technology and Development in Nigeria; Chom Bagu, a pro-democracy activist; Ezenwa Nwagu, a community development expert and David Ugolor, an environmental activist.
The statement by the group said in part: “A few weeks ago, the Governor of Kaduna State, Mr. Nasir El-Rufai, urged Nigerians to give President Buhari time to recover from his sickness. The plea was made after the governor had visited and presumably assessed the state of the president’s health at the Presidential Villa in Abuja.
“However, due to the apparent deterioration in the president’s health condition, he has neither been seen in public in the last one week nor attended the last two meetings of the FEC. His absence at the last Jumat service in the villa has fuelled further speculations and rumours on President Buhari’s medical condition. But instead of embarking on regular briefing on the actual state of the health of President Buhari, officials of the federal government have continued to assure the Nigerian people that there is no need for apprehension over the matter.
“In defending the absence of the President at the last FEC meeting and other state functions, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Garba Shehu, stated that ‘the President’s doctors have advised on his taking things slowly, as he fully recovers from the long period of treatment in the United Kingdom some weeks ago’.
As we join the Nigerian people of goodwill to pray for a speedy recovery of President Buhari, we are compelled to advise him to heed the advice of his personal physicians by taking a rest to attend to his health without any further delay.”
Other interest groups such as Afenifere, a pan-Yoruba socio-cultural group; the Ohanaeze Ndigbo, an umbrella body for the Igbo; the Arewa Consultative Forum, ACF, a cultural organisation from the North; and the National Caretaker Committee of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, have equally lent their voices to the development, supporting the need for proper management of the health of the president so as not to throw the country into crisis. That is as far they could all agree.
For instance, Afenifere commended Akande for shunning sentiments by revealing that some people were capitalising on the president’s health to fulfill selfish objectives. Seinde Arogbofa, secretary-general of the group, in an interview said the statement by the former national leader of the APC was devoid of politics and truthful. He said: “Akande has spoken well, a statesman should be able to speak irrespective of party affiliations. What Chief Akande said could not have come at a better time than now. The President meant well, but he has no good health to match the intention. Those close to him, some ministers inclusive, are feeding fat on this national misfortune to carry out their personal agenda.
“The wife of the president once complained, a while ago, that certain characters in the Presidency were not only standing between her and her husband but standing between the country and the president. So, we should commend him (Akande) for saying what a statesman should say.”
Similarly, the PDP national caretaker committee said that the president ill-health had provided a leeway for some individuals to hijack the government from Buhari. The group said it was normal for president to be sick, but condemned the Presidency for refusing to disclose the true state of his health.
Dayo Adeyeye, spokesperson for the Ahmed Makarfi-led caretaker committee, reasoned that Buhari must have been in bad health for him to miss three FEC meetings consecutively. He said: “We sympathise with the president on his health and we pray that God will lay His hands on him. However, it is now certain that the country in now being ruled by a cabal. Members of the cabal are not known.
“Who is in charge of the country now? We don’t know. Nigeria is now on auto pilot. We don’t know who is rocking the country and who exactly is churning out orders or exercising the executive powers of the president anymore. This can’t happen in saner climes. We have a president who has not been seen in public for some days and the government is not worried.”
On his part, Nnia Nwodo, president-general of the Ohanaeze, while speaking at a press briefing in Enugu, on Wednesday, May 3, said Nigerians deserved to know the state of health of their president and the medical attention available to him. Nwodo said: “We note with sadness the state of health of the president and his incapacity to attend to important state functions. We pray for his speedy recovery. We advise the Presidency to be more open with the state of the president’s health. Nigerians ought to know what is wrong with their president and how adequately he is being treated.”
All the organisations also would want Buhari to step aside and go on another medical vacation to look after his health as canvassed by Falana and other activists.
But the ACF objected to those calling on Buhari to step aside and face his health and those who accused people around the president of exploiting his health for selfish reasons.
Muhammadu Ibrahim, national publicity secretary of the ACF, said in a statement in Kaduna on Tuesday, May 2, that the calls were unnecessary and uncalled for.
According to the ACF, what Nigerians should do now is to pray for the good health of the president. The statement said in part: “Arewa Consultative Forum has observed with concern that some individuals are carelessly making unnecessary remarks pertaining to the health of President Muhammadu Buhari. “What Nigerians need to do now is to pray for his (president) good health and not to speculate or draw conclusions which will do no one any good. ACF advises Nigerians to please pray for the improvement of Mr. President’s health so that he can serve the nation with more vigour.”
That notwithstanding, the Presidency seemed to have steered clear of the raging controversy on Akande’s comments. But it assured Nigerians that there was no need for apprehension on the state of health of the president.
Garba Shehu, senior special assistant to the president on Media and Publicity, in a statement reminded the nation that on his return to the country the president had disclosed his state of health and why he would have to return there for further treatment. He said the president was still convalescing and that full recovery could be sometimes a slow process, requiring periods of rest and relaxation.
Be that as it may, Mohammed assured that: “Despite his lack of visibility, Nigerians should be assured that President Buhari has not abdicated his role as the commander-in-chief of Nigeria. He receives daily briefings on the activities of government, and confers regularly with his vice-president, Professor Yemi Osinbajo.
“God is the giver of life and health. We are grateful that He has seen our president through the worst period of his convalescence in London.”
That notwithstanding, Nigerians would be more comfortable to know who is charge as it was the case when Buhari was on medical vacation than now that everything seems to be shrouded in secrecy. Indeed, the sickness of the president should not be a motive to ground the country to a halt through power struggle and political gamesmanship because Nigerians are not likely to be able to go through another two years of economic doldrums which the present administration has not been able to bring out the country.
All things being equal Nigerians believe that the nation would be better served with President Buhari in good health to serve through his mandate.
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