There is a certain defensiveness that could pass for denialism. Before our very eyes, President Muhammadu Buhari appears to be facing a life-threatening health challenge. It is a season of creative euphemisms employed by the president’s defenders to downplay the evidence of reality.
A picture of things as they are was presented by Olalekan Adetayo and Bayo Akinloye in an April 23 Punch report: “Fresh anxiety is mounting over the state of health of President Muhammadu Buhari, who returned to the country on March 10 after a 49-day medical sojourn in London, United Kingdom. The 74-year-old Nigerian leader was only seen in public once throughout last week, when he joined other Muslim faithful for a Juma’at service on Friday at a mosque located near his office inside the Presidential Villa, Abuja. The service lasted less than one hour after which Buhari returned to his residence. Before Friday’s brief appearance, the last time he was seen in public was penultimate Friday when he attended the same service at the same venue. Presidency sources attributed the president’s continuous non-appearance at public events to his ailing health and the need to take further rest.”
The report continued: “One of our correspondents reported that, although some government officials were reported to have met with Buhari in his office during the week to update him on developments in their ministries, no photographs or video recordings of such encounters were made available by the Presidency, which was contrary to the usual practice. Although the government officials spoke with reporters after their separate meetings with the president, the absence of such photographs and video recordings raised doubts as to whether, indeed, the government officials met with the president.”
This representation of reality landed the newspaper’s Presidential Villa watcher Adetayo in the soup as he was robotically expelled from Aso Rock by Buhari’s Chief Security Officer (CSO), Bashir Abubakar. The revolting reaction has been reversed, but it is thought-provoking that Buhari’s Special Adviser on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, tweeted: “We weren’t consulted in the media office by the CSO before he expelled the Punch reporter. President Buhari is committed to press freedom.” If this is true, then it would suggest that the president and his CSO are not necessarily on the same page when it comes to non-negotiable respect for press freedom. If that is the case, it is curious that this CSO is still the CSO.
The defensive game took a less physical dimension with a response by Buhari’s Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, to rising public criticism of the president’s serial absence from the regular meetings of the Federal Executive Council (FEC) which he is supposed to chair. After another non-appearance by Buhari on April 26, Shehu said in a statement: “As eager as he is to be up and about, the president’s doctors have advised on his taking things slowly, as he fully recovers from the long period of treatment in the United Kingdom some weeks ago. President Buhari himself, on his return to the country, made Nigerians aware of the state of his health while he was in London. Full recovery is sometimes a slow process, requiring periods of rest and relaxation, as the Minister for Information, Lai Mohammed, intimated in his press briefing after the FEC meeting on Wednesday.”
Shehu added: “Despite his lack of visibility, Nigerians should rest assured that President Buhari has not abdicated his role as Commander-in-Chief of the Nigeria Armed Forces. He receives daily briefings on the activities of government, and confers regularly with his Vice President, Professor Yemi Osinbajo. His private residence, where he has been spending the majority of his time recently, has a fully equipped office.” A question may be asked: If the president can work from home, does he really need another office outside his home?
There are those who argue that Buhari’s poor health is bad enough to necessitate his resignation. Apparently, Buhari himself does not think so. Also, his loyalists do not think so. But the truth cannot be denied. To go by appearances, President Buhari is in bad shape. This perhaps explains the observation that the Presidency seems reluctant to share photos and videos of his alleged recent meetings with government functionaries “contrary to the usual practice.”
If pictures are more graphic than words, it is easy to understand why the Presidency is sticking to words in conveying Buhari’s health condition. Pictures would tell it all; and Buhari’s defenders don’t want telling images.
How long can the game last? Sooner or later, it will be so glaring that Buhari’s bad health cannot allow him to perform. What will happen when the country comes to the point that is beyond denial?
It is interesting to observe the thinking of the opposition on this issue. The chairman of the Caretaker Committee of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Ahmed Makarfi, was quoted as saying: “My take is that if the president is not fully fit to stay in office, it is better that he tell Nigerians, so that the vice president will continue to be Acting President, exercising the powers of acting president. For a number of reasons, the PDP wishes the president well, for stability of this country, political stability, and the fact that we want to defeat a sitting president. We don’t want any confusion politically in this country. “
This is agenda-setting thinking. Why must Buhari remain in office if his health does not permit it? To suggest that there will be “confusion politically” if Buhari is not well enough to continue in office is to insist that he must remain in office even if his health condition does not allow it.
Living in denial happens; so does dying in denial. A denial is a denial, and a denialist is a denialist. It remains to be seen whether denialism can resolve Buhari’s undeniable health condition and its undeniable implications.
It is a critical juncture in the country’s progression, and the country’s progress may suffer retrogression just because of the president’s ill health and the denialism of the president and his defenders. .
The post Living and dying in denial appeared first on The Nation Nigeria.