Vice-President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo is currently meeting the Emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi and some other northern leaders behind closed doors at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Aside from the Emir, others in attendance include; the Lamido of Adamawa, Muhammadu Mustapha; and Alhaji Ahmed Joda among others.
Details of the meeting is however sketchy as at the time of filing this report.
Details later…
President Muhammadu Buhari on Monday hosted three of his young supporters in Aso Villa, Abuja.
The three children; Maya (3 years old), Aisha (10 years old) and Nicole (12 years) demonstrated their support for the president during, before and after the 2015 presidential elections.
This was revealed in a series of tweets by the presidential social media aide, Bashir Ahmad @bashirAhmaad.
Maya meets PMB today, she was so shy — Mr. President jokily says; how can you be so shy when your video has been seen all over the world. pic.twitter.com/uoRB5ODqfE
— Bashir Ahmad (@BashirAhmaad) October 16, 2017
‘Thank you very much for your contribution’ President @MBuhari to Nicole, who donated her lunch money to his campaign team 3 years ago. pic.twitter.com/WY42w6Prj2
— Bashir Ahmad (@BashirAhmaad) October 16, 2017
As she wished in her 26/8/17 letter, Aisha Aliyu Gebi has today, met President @MBuhari ‘face to face’, she came along with the letter too. pic.twitter.com/FLg6RyJPfD
— Bashir Ahmad (@BashirAhmaad) October 16, 2017
He wrote, “The President Muhammadu Buhari’s guests are here in the Presidential Villa. Maya – 3 years old Aisha – 10 years old Nicole – 12 years.”
Maya is a three-year-old girl who did a 6 seconds video praying for President Muhammadu Buhari while Nicole was the schoolgirl who donated her lunch money to the president while he was a presidential candidate.
Aisha, on the other hand, is the 10-year-old girl who claims to be the president’s number one fan and wrote a letter seeking permission to see the president one-on-one.
President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday met with governors and leaders of south-eastern states over the recent agitations in the region.
The meeting held inside the new Banquet hall of the State House in Abuja shortly after Islamic prayers.
The leader of Ohanaeze Ndigbo, John Nwodo, who spoke with State House correspondents after the meeting said they had a “frank and robust exchange” with the president concerning the alleged neglect of the region by successive administrations.
“We dealt with problems of development in the South-east, basic capital projects which have for a very long time been neglected not just from this government but for a very long time.
“Major arteries of federal highways in the South-east have been in complete state of disrepair. Enugu-Onitsha, Enugu-Port Harcourt, Aba-Ikot Ikpene are virtually impassable.
“We talked about the inland waterways and the dredging of the River Niger. We talked about the reticulation of gas pipeline on the South-east. We export gas from the south-east to the other parts of the country, but there is no reticulation of the pipeline and industrial clusters in the south-east,” he said.
Nwodo also said the meeting discussed the bad state of the only international airport in the region.
“We got assurance from the president that he will deal with each of those problems,” he said.
The Ohanaeze leader said the meeting also discussed alleged marginalization of the South-east by the Buhari administration, saying, “like I have said these problems have been there overtime and we have had several presidents, it didn’t just happen in the last two years. But we expressed the desire that he should be able to address them.”
He said the South-east leaders were confident the president will deliver on his promise to them.
“There is no reason for me to doubt him because this is the first time I have had this interaction with him. I have the feeling that he spoke to us very frankly,” he said.
On whether the meeting discussed the issue of the Indigenous Peoples Of Biafra, IPOB, an organisation seeking secession from the Nigerian state, the Igbo leader said, “We talked about IPOB as a symptomatic consequence of the continuous marginalization of the South-east over a long period of time.
“Understandably our children are restive and we want to make sure that the federal government is responsive to the issues that have cumulated in the quintessence of these agitations.”
The federal government has since declared IPOB a terrorist organisation and arrested several of its members.
Other issues discussed, according to Mr. Nwodo, include “devolution of powers, the constitution, the paucity of the states and local governments in our place.”
“And the president has asked that he be given time to look at this more holistically,” he said.
TheThose who attended the meeting include governors from the South-east, traditional rulers and leaders of the Ohanaeze Ndi Igbo.
Governor Abiola Ajimobi of Oyo State on Tuesday met President Muhammadu Buhari in his office in Aso Rock to report the Olubadan of Ibadanland, Oba Saliu Adetunji and former governor Rashidi Ladoja.
Ajimobi told State House correspondents that he called the President’s attention to the face-off between him and the monarch over the recently reviewed Olubadan Chieftaincy Declaration.
He said he also called the President’s attention to the fact that the crisis created by the review had been politicised, having been hijacked by a politician who is interested in his office.
The governor said he, however, assured Buhari that although the Olubadan deserved to be deposed based on his actions, he would not remove him because of the father-son relationship between them.
TheNewsGuru.com reports that the feud between the governor and the Olubadan had thickened following the governor’s elevation and coronation of some chiefs as kings in Ibadanland.
However, the governor had reiterated at the coronation ceremony that the newly coronated kings are all under the Olubadan.
TheNewsGuru.com reports that the Olubadan had also challenged the coronation describing it as illegal.
Details later…
President Muhammadu Buhari on Tuesday met behind closed doors with service chiefs, Minister of Defence, retired Brig. Mansur Dan-Ali and the National Security Adviser (NSA), retired Maj.-Gen. Babagana Monguno to discuss current security challenges in the country.
As at the time of filing this report, the meeting presided over by President Buhari is still ongoing.
It is also being attended by the Director General of the State Security Services (SSS), Lawal Daura, the acting Director of the Nigeria Intelligence Agency (NIA), Amb. Arab Yadam, and the representative of the Inspector-General of Police.
The service chiefs at the meeting include Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), Gen. Gabriel Olonisakin; Chief of Army Staff, Major-Gen. Tukur Buratai; Chief of Naval Staff, Rear Admiral Ibok-Ete Ekwe Ibas and the Chief of Air Staff, AVM Sadique Abubakar.
Details later…
President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday led dignitaries to attend a special Juma’at service in commemoration of the nation’s 57th Independence Anniversary.
The service was held inside a mosque near the President’s office at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Buhari was joined at the prayer session by the President of the Senate, Bukola Saraki; and former Vice-President Namadi Sambo among others.
SP Saraki, Namadi Sambo, Bauchi Gov, Ministers and other govt officials join President Buhari to observe Juma'at Prayer to mark #NigeriaAt57 pic.twitter.com/X68JqafFpj
— Bashir Ahmad (@BashirAhmaad) September 29, 2017
The Chief of Army Staff, Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai; Chief of Air Staff, Air Marshal Abubakar Sadique; Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris; and Comptroller-General of Customs, Hameed Ali, also attended the service.
Others in attendance were the Minister of the Interior, Abdurahman Danbazzau; Minister of Water Resources, Suleiman Adamu; Minister of Communications, Adebayo Shittu and some other senior presidency officials
Saraki later told State House correspondents that the nation had achieved a lot in the 57 years of its independence.
He urged Nigerians to continue to pray for the country.
“A lot of people would say what are we congratulating ourselves about, we have achieved a lot. We have been able to maintain our peace despite our diversity.”
President Muhammadu Buhari on Friday played host to Uganda President, Yoweri Museveni in Aso Villa, Abuja.
TheNewsGuru.com reports that the two leaders met behind closed doors at about 2.52ppm.
TheNewsGuru.com reports that the Ugandan president has been showing interest and concern over the activities of the deadly Boko Haram sect operating in Nigeria over five years ago.
Mr. Museveni was quoted in 2014, during the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan, as warning the Nigerian government against negotiating with the Boko Haram insurgents.
“It would be a mistake for the government of Nigeria to negotiate with these people.”
“The most important thing is to defeat them, then negotiations can come after that,’’ Museveni told a local Ugandan newspaper in an interview in May 2014.
The Commonwealth Medical Association and the Nigerian Medical Association have asked President Muhammadu Buhari to use the Aso Rock clinic henceforth.
Vice-President, Commonwealth Medical Association, Dr. Osahon Enabulele, said it was embarrassing the way public office holders involved in medical tourism.
He said Nigeria had been losing humongous sums of money in foreign exchange on account of its leaders’ medical tourism to other countries.
He said, “The country needs to think of how to reverse this unfortunate trend. Nigeria is in a recession and this is not the time for us to drain our economy by political office holders, whose expenses are borne by the state. I hope and pray that we will have the right leadership that will act by example to sort this out because that is the first step.
“So, I will urge all political holders, including Mr. President, to try to live by example. The President should try as much as possible, irrespective of what may be the problem, to see how he can stay in the country and see how he can get his medical needs attended to at the State House Clinic, even if it means importing facilities that are not available here.
“In any case, if N3.16bn was budgeted for the State House Clinic in 2016 and 2017, I will expect that the money is supposed to improve the clinic to a global standard that will have most of all the needed facilities and equipment. There is no reason whatsoever to say you are looking somewhere else for medical care. It is increasingly embarrassing to see public office holders go outside the shores of Nigeria to look for care.”
Enabulele added, “The law as it currently exists in our country, states very clearly that except in exceptional cases that have been so determined by medical boards and with approval by the minister of health, no political office holder has any right to be sponsored with taxpayers’ resources for any foreign medical trip. So, even the laws are there.
President of the Nigerian Medical Association, Prof. Mike Ogirima said the President wouldn’t have needed to travel abroad, if the Presidential villa clinic was well equipped.
He said, “We are appealing to the President to replicate whatever experience he had in London here at home. He should equip our hospitals. We can’t keep funding the Aso Villa Clinic if it’s not being used. That clinic should be equipped so as to cater for the President’s medical need.
“The Federal Government has not been fulfilling an agreement it signed with other members of the Economic Community of West African States to set aside 15 per cent of the budget for the health care sector. If this happens, we would be able to equip our hospitals so that the President wouldn’t need to travel for medical treatment abroad again.”
The Acting President, Yemi Osinbajo, and a former Head of State, Gen. Abdulsalami Abubakar (retd.), are currently meeting behind closed door.
The meeting is holding in Osinbajo’s office inside the Presidential Villa, Abuja.
Details later…
A popular communist and Convener of Every Nigerian Do Something (ENDS) has said President Muhammadu Buhari is seriously sick and requires further urgent medical attention.
Braimah alleged that some cabals who were selfishly gaining from the president’s ill health are blocking him from accessing urgent and quality medical attention.
Braimah revealed this in a statement on Friday.
According to him, “There can be no denying how chronically ill president Muhammadu Buhari looks when he seldom does appear in public. The last time was last week Friday when Kaduna state governor Nasir el-Rufai came visiting.
“The videos of Buhari walking for Friday prayers bring tears to eyes. His asthenic figure now no more than skin-and-bones as he sat down for the Jummah service was heart-wrenching.
“How can a people be so cold they expose a grandfather to this type of extreme stress and deprive him from his needed rest and medical expert attention by tasking him to lead the world’s most complex nation?
“Have we as a people lost our humanity that we continue to task Buhari like this and not campaign for him to be relieved of our burden and rest towards recovery?
“It is insane to continue to deprive him and the nation by locking him up and burdening him with a challenge too heavy for even a strong young man to bear talk-less an old man who just returned from a 49-day leave in which he received blood transfusions and unknown cocktails of serious medications.
“For those of us in the medical profession, we recognize the president’s loss of hair on his head and facial hair as well as his reported blood transfusions as possible evidence of cancer chemotherapy.
“God forbid, however if this is the condition the president is being managed for that the cabal is hiding from the people, the wickedness of the selfish cabal that forces him to remain locked up, “dying” in Aso Rock instead of receiving best therapy, should be vehemently opposed by us masses.
“Whoever is found guilty of hiding any serious diagnosis the president may have and bundling him back to deteriorate in Aso Rock under pressure of Nigeria’s humongous burden should be dealt with according to the full extent of the law. This is not only criminal but sinful.
“A great fear is, what if (God forbid) president Buhari should collapse? This time he may not yet have handed over to Vice president Yemi Osinbajo as “acting president” and Nigeria may be thrown into the chaos that perhaps some desperate politicians eyeing the presidency seat are secretly plotting for. Nigeria cannot afford to be thrown into such state of dilemma and disarray.
“It’s time for Nigerians to demand full disclosure of the true state of health of president Muhammadu Buhari and immediate best options for him to be allowed to rest and recover instead of being locked up to literally die under the weight of Nigeria”.