Catholic Bishop, Mathew Kukah of the Sokoto Archdiocese has reacted to the speculations surrounding the health status of the President, Muhammadu Buhari.
The cleric while addressing journalists in Abuja advised citizens to desist from making the health of Nigeria’s public figures the subject matter in political discussions or rumours.
Bishop Kukah cited former US President, Ronald Reagan who suffered from Alzheimer’s disease as an example noting that nobody knew of his health condition. He added that so many public figures in the world had serious health problems which were hidden from the public eyes to avoid undue attention.
He said: “I do not think that the health of any Nigerian should be the subject of politics or speculations.
“It is something I find so troubling because nobody does the things we do in Nigeria.
“Reagan was suffering from Alzheimer’s and for the greater part of ten years nobody had the slightest idea, what was happening to Reagan.”
Bishop Kukah further said: “I think the question we should be asking is: ‘what right do people have to express themselves?’ We are in a democracy and people should be allowed to express themselves because ours is a representative democracy.
“There are representatives and if people want to stop being a part of Nigeria there is a process for achieving that.
“The second point is that we cannot speculate as to intentions and motives unless you legitimately bring a person to court and say why have you done X Y Z? You can only speculate. And I don’t think we should be depending on speculations.”
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