President Muhammadu Buhari traveled to London, United Kingdom, Monday for a routine emergency check-up.
The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), however, was not unaffected by the trip and denounced it as “vexatious” given “the awful and failed status of the public health care system in Nigeria since the current government began in 2015.”
Femi Adesina, the president’s special media and publicity adviser, provided only a few facts about his most recent trip on his own Twitter account. As Buhari presided over an emergency National Security Council meeting earlier in the day, no prior information was supplied to suggest that the travel had been planned.
Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, HURIWA’s National Coordinator, said in a statement: “Before he was elected, during the campaign, the then-All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate made a very heavy weather of “his resolve” to end medical tourism in Nigeria, which he said was costing the country so much needed foreign exchange. He also criticized politicians who travel abroad for medical treatment.
“But since coming on board, the few healthcare facilities that were put in place by previous governments, even the Federal Medical Centres that were hitherto functioning optimally, have all become moribund, largely due to mismanagement of funds for public healthcare by officials at various levels.
“The health care system has also witnessed several industrial actions and strikes by medical staff and non-medical staff. Yet, President Buhari has spent over 200 hundred days on a foreign medical trip with our money.”
HURIWA added: “The most significant lesson Nigerians should learn from Buhari’s medical travels, which are obviously unending and massively capital intensive, is to never again elect someone who is medically unfit to govern.
“Nigerians must have it at the back of their minds before casting their votes, with few weeks to the end of his first term in office, Buhari has spent a total of 404 days (a year and 39 days) travelling to 33 countries on four continents in about four years of his first term in office, as captured by a media report recently.
“Most of these travels are said to be coded medical tours costing Nigeria so much in foreign exchange.”
