FEMI Adesina, Former Special Adviser on Media and Publicity to the late President Muhammadu Buhari, has defended his former principal’s frequent medical trips abroad.
He said Buhari “could have long been dead” had he relied on Nigeria’s healthcare system.
Speaking during an interview on Channels Television, Tuesday morning, Adesina said Buhari’s decision to seek medical care in London was rooted in a need for survival before pursuing a reform.
He said this while defending the renewed scrutiny over the state of Nigeria’s public health infrastructure and Buhari’s failure to turn the sector around when he was president.
“Like I said, he always had his medicals in London, even when he was not in office, so it was not only about the time he was president. He had always had them in London,” Adesina said.
“And then, you have to be alive first to get certain things changed or corrected in your country.
“If he had said, ‘I would do my medicals in Nigeria,’ just as a show-off or something, he could have long been dead because there might not have been the expertise needed in the country,” he said.
Adesina’s remarks came amid ongoing criticism surrounding Buhari’s death in a foreign hospital. The former president passed away in London on Sunday, July 13, at the age of 82 after a prolonged illness.
The ICIR recalls that Buhari had faced years of public backlash for routinely seeking medical treatment abroad. Throughout his presidency, he had frequently travelled to London for medical treatment.
Particularly, during his first time as civilian leader, from 2016 to 2018, he spent extended periods in London for undisclosed medical treatment, fuelling speculation about his health and capacity to govern.
Many argued that such trips were a symbol of his administration’s lack of confidence in Nigerian hospitals, even as millions of Nigerians continued to endure poor access to basic healthcare.
But Adesina insisted that Buhari’s medical trips were necessary for him to lead the country through reforms.
“But he needed to be alive to lead the country to a point where we would have that expertise.
“Those who talk of going abroad don’t realise that a man needs to be alive first before he can effect change,” he added.
The ICIR reported in 2017 that between 2007 and 2017, over N9.14 billion was budgeted for the State House Clinic, which the president and other top government officials could use.
However, the facility was poorly equipped, with Buhari’s wife, Aisha, publicly complaining that it lacked basic supplies such as syringes and paracetamol.
That same year, Zahra Buhari, daughter of the late president, purportedly criticised the State Clinic’s condition, accusing its management of failing to justify its N331.7 million budget.
The revelations came even as Buhari was frequently out of the country for medical attention.
Despite the over N3.1 billion allocated to the State House Clinic in 2016 and 2017, more than what many federal teaching hospitals reportedly received, the facility failed to serve even its core users.
In 2016, just a year after taking office, Buhari left for a 10-day medical trip to London to treat an ear infection. He would go on to spend over 100 days abroad in 2017 alone, drawing public outrage.
Mustapha Usman is an investigative journalist with the International Centre for Investigative Reporting. You can easily reach him via: musman@icirnigeria.com. He tweets @UsmanMustapha_M