PDP Asks Buhari To Declare Health Status As President Extends Vacation
President
Muhammadu Buhari is sick, but not terminally ill, The PUNCH gathered on
Sunday.
A top
government official, who spoke to one of our correspondents on condition of
anonymity, said this shortly after the Presidency announced Buhari’s decision
to extend his two-week vacation.
Before now,
the Presidency had insisted that the President was not sick, saying he would
only use the opportunity of his short vacation to undergo check-ups.
But the
government official admitted on Sunday that Buhari was sick.
He, however,
insisted that the President was not ill.
“The
President is sick. But it will not be correct to say he is terminally ill.
Illness has more to do with terminal disease. The President is only under the
weather; he is not terminally ill,” he explained.
Before the
announcement, however, arrangements were on to receive Buhari in Abuja, on
Sunday, in preparation for his resumption on Monday.
Officials
were put on the alert pending the confirmation from the Protocol Unit on the
time the President would arrive.
The National
Youth Council of Nigeria had also said it had mobilised 15,000 youths across
the country to join in receiving Buhari at the Presidential Wing of the Nnamdi
Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja.
As of the
time the statement on the extension was released, State House correspondents
were on standby to join the delegation that would receive the President.
The Special
Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr. Femi Adesina, had,
penultimate week, in an interview with CNBC Africa, monitored in Abuja
insisted that Buhari was not ill.
Adesina had
insisted that Buhari was only in London for vacation and was not in any
hospital.
He had said,
“The President is in London on vacation. He is not in any hospital and he
is not ill.
“When he was
travelling last week, the statement we put out was that he was going on
vacation and during the vacation, he would do routine medical check-up and
nothing has changed from what we pushed out last week.”
Earlier on
Sunday, the Presidency had announced that Buhari’s 10-day vacation to the UK
had been extended.
The
extension was contained in a three-paragraph statement made available to
journalists by Adesina.
Adesina said
the extension was necessary to allow the President complete a series of tests
recommended by his doctors and get the results.
Although he
said Buhari had already dispatched a letter to the National Assembly on the
extension, he did not specify the duration of the extension.
The
statement read, “President Muhammadu Buhari has written to the National
Assembly, today, February 5, 2017, informing it of his desire to extend his
leave in order to complete and receive the results of a series of tests
recommended by his doctors.
“The
President had planned to return to Abuja this (Sunday) evening, but was advised
to complete the test cycle before returning. The notice has since been
dispatched to the Senate President, and Speaker, House of Representatives.
“Mr. President
expresses his sincere gratitude to Nigerians for their concern, prayers and
kind wishes.”
Shortly
after Buhari left Nigeria penultimate Thursday for London, there were reports
that he had passed on in a London hospital.
The
Presidency had since denied the reports.
‘Senate has
received Buhari’s letter’
When
contacted, the Special Adviser to the Senate President on Media and Publicity,
Mr. Yusuph Olaniyonu, confirmed the transmission of the letter from the
Presidency to the leadership of the National Assembly.
He however
declined to disclose the content of the letter.
“I can
confirm to you that a letter has been transmitted from the Presidency to the
Senate,” he said.
However, a
source at the Office of the President of the Senate, who spoke on condition of
anonymity as the letter was meant to be announced to lawmakers on the floor of
the Senate during plenary, said Saraki had yet to receive the letter in person.
He said,
“I’ve been able to confirm that the letter had been transmitted to the Senate.
Saraki has been informed about it but he has not collected it, maybe because he
is currently out of town.”
The
Chairman, Senate Committee on Media and Public Affairs, Senator Sabi Abdullahi,
when asked if the lawmakers would suspend their current recess to consider
Buhari’s letter, said he was somewhere in his constituency (Niger North
Senatorial District) and would not speak on the matter without having all the
details.
Also, the
Leader of the House of Representatives, Mr. Femi Gbajabiamila, told The
PUNCH, on Sunday, that there was no need to reconvene the House for the
purpose of considering Buhari’s letter.
Gbajabiamila,
a lawyer, explained that the President had already done the most important
thing by triggering off the constitutional process to avoid a vacuum and to
ensure that there was no crisis.
He advised
Nigerians to stop spreading rumours as Buhari clearly gave the reason he would
not return to the country for now.
Part of an
electronic mail he sent to The PUNCH, read, “I do not believe there is a
need to reconvene for purposes of considering the letter. As you know, a
President can go on leave and also extend same if there is a need to.
“The
important thing is there is no power vacuum for as long as a President or
Governor is absent.
“The
constitutional safeguard has been triggered off and there is no constitutional
crisis.
“The
President did give the reason for the extension. The reason is not unusual and
we should not give in to speculation and unfounded rumours.”
I didn’t
speak on Buhari’s return –Mohammed
Meanwhile,
the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, has denied
speaking on the return of Buhari.
While the
nation awaits Buhari’s return, Mohammed said in a statement, on Sunday, that
the reports attributed to him, claiming that the President wouldn’t return
because of faulty aircraft, was false.
The
minister, in a statement by his aide, Mr. Segun Adeyemi, said he did not speak
with anyone.
The
statement added, “The minister has not spoken to anyone on the issue of the
President’s return, hence this report is another from the stable of the
purveyors of fake news and should be disregarded.”
PDP, APC
clash over President’s health status
Meanwhile,
the National Caretaker Committee of the Peoples Democratic Party called on
Buhari to tell Nigerians the true state of his health.
The main
opposition party was reacting to the inability of the President to return to
Nigeria from the UK, where he had been on holiday for more than 10 days.
The PDP said
it was wrong for the President to also send letter to the National Assembly,
extending his leave, without telling Nigerians when he would resume.
Spokesperson
for the Senator Ahmed Makarfi-led Caretaker Committee, Mr. Dayo Adeyeye, stated
this in a telephone interview with one of our correspondents.
But the
ruling All Progressives Congress berated the PDP, saying the opposition party
should pray for the President instead of spreading rumours.
The PDP
spokesman, who was a former Minister of State for Works, however, said it was
wrong for the President and his handlers to be trivialising the health of the
President.
He said the
President had chosen a wrong approach to address the issue of his health since
he assumed office.
He said,
“The President should know he is not a private citizen.
“He should
know that Nigerians are the ones paying his health bills and therefore, he
should tell them the true state of his health.
“He should
not treat Nigerians with levity and he should also know what is obtainable in
civilised countries. Nigeria is not a jungle.
“Imagine the
President talking about a leave extension but not saying when he would resume?”
Adeyeye
stated that there was no way the President could claim to be awaiting the
outcome of medical tests without definite dates.
“Medical tests
have dates of collection of results. It can’t be open-ended without dates,” he
said.
But the APC
urged the PDP to join other well-meaning Nigerians to pray for the
President instead of sensing an opportunity to get even.
The National
Publicity Secretary of the APC, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi, said this in a
telephone interview with one of our correspondents on Sunday.
Abdullahi
stated, “This is the President of the country. The elections are over; he is
our President, he is the President of Nigeria not that of the APC or the PDP.
If the President has told us that he needs to stay back to do some other
medical things, it behoves us, as responsible citizens, to pray for him and
stop sensing an opportunity to retaliate.
“Does the
PDP know more than what we have been told? What we know is what we have been
told.
“We believe
that the President has demonstrated an acute sense of responsibility. We are
all living witnesses to our recent history where a President travelled and did
not even communicate to the National Assembly the appropriate document to make
the then Vice-President act in his stead.
“But this is
a President that, on every occasion that he has to travel, he not only
communicate to the National Assembly, but creates the enabling environment and
the space for the Vice-President to act as President in his absence.
“I don’t
know why people will start going green in the eyes as if we are actually hoping
that tragedy befalls this country.
“The PDP
should not behave in a way that will make Nigerians begin to think that it is
actually spreading the rumour that the President is dead.”
Also, the
Catholic Bishop of Awka Diocese in Anambra State, Most Rev. Paulinus Ezeokafor,
on Sunday, asked Buhari to show himself to Nigerians to douse the tension in
the land.
Ezeokafor,
who spoke to journalists at the annual meeting with the Religious Council in
the diocese at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, Awka, said it was normal that people
asked questions about the health of their President as he was not a private
citizen.
The cleric
added, “We pray that he comes back in good health, those asking about his state
of health have the right to know where their President is and how he is doing.
“It is
normal to be sick because he is a human being like any other person.
“The
interest in Buhari’s state of health is like the way people, all over the
world, were worried when the late Pope John Paul 11 and Nelson Mandela were
sick in hospital.
“It is high
time he said something so that the suspicion and guessing will die down.”
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