POLL RESULTS: Nigerians vote ‘NO’ to President Buhari’s medical vacation abroad

In an overwhelming ‘NO’ vote, Nigerians would rather that President Muhammadu Buhari stayed back in the country to enjoy his vacation and, perhaps, meet with his personal physicians.

This is the outcome of a survey conducted online by Ripples Nigeria over a 10-day period during which the news platform reached out to more than one million citizens. Of the lot, 1,391 actively participated in the survey while the post was shared 3682 times with over 12,000 likes.

Asked to vote, ‘YES’ or ‘NO’ to the question, “With N3.9bn budgeted for Aso Rock Clinic, should Buhari seek medical care abroad”? 75.3% of respondents voted ‘NO’ while only 21.1% voted ‘YES’. 3.5% of voters were undecided.

In an engaging conversation, the survey attracted over 3,200 comments and the concern of many who voted ‘NO’ is that it was difficult to reconcile the several billions allocated to the health sector annually and the terrible decay in the nation’s hospitals.

Staying back home, according to most, was the surest way the President could have truly led by example and convinced citizens on the ruling party’s value re-orientation campaign which is focused on ‘Buy made in Nigeria.’

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President Buhari triggered the debate over propriety of holidaying abroad when his office announced on January 19 that he had been slated for medical vacation in London beginning January, 23.

While in London, rumours of President Buhari’s death made the rounds but these have since been dispelled with pictures of him, his wife, Aisha, and Governor Ibikunle Amosun of Ogun State going viral.

Speaking recently on CNBC, Femi Adesina, Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity 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.

“If anybody has fed something else into the rumour mill that is just what it is, rumour.”

Adesina went further to state that nobody will force the President to speak from London as it remains his right whether to talk or not.

Buhari is due back in Nigeria on February 6.

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