Nigerian president returns from holiday: Aide
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ABUJA: Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari returned from his annual vacation, his office said in a statement, as the presidential race in the country intensifies ahead of February polls.
“President @Mbuhari returns to Abuja from the UK, after a 10 working day vacation,” said Bashir Ahmad, Buhari’s new media aide, in a statement posted on Twitter.
Buhari started his vacation in London from August 3 without disclosing whether he would see his doctor while there, raising concerns about his health and his ability to campaign for re-election next year.
The vacation was the latest of several trips that the 75-year-old former general took to the British capital in recent months.
Buhari spent almost half of 2017 in London receiving treatment for an undisclosed ailment.
Nigeria’s main opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has always insisted Buhari is unwell and unfit to govern, but his aides have dismissed the claims.
In recent weeks, Buhari’s ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) has been hit by a series of defections to the PDP.
Though the opposition has yet to declare a candidate, the pressure is on Buhari to keep the broad coalition of APC members together and secure victory.
The health of the head of state is a sensitive issue in Nigeria following the 2010 death of then-president Umaru Musa Yar’adua, which followed months of treatment abroad and sparked political turmoil.
Doctors Without Borders (MSF) said Friday it was providing emergency help after 33 children died in a camp housing people displaced by the Boko Haram insurgency in northeast Nigeria.
MSF said that the children died of malnutrition, diarrhoea and malaria between August 2-15 in Bama, once the second-largest town in the ravaged state of Borno but now a humanitarian hub.
Children were arriving at the camp in a “critical condition” and their health was worsening in the absence of proper medical care, MSF said in a press statement.
The Nigerian government claims that Boko Haram Islamists are no longer a potent threat but since April more than 10,000 people have sought shelter in Bama, putting pressure on a camp that hit its maximum capacity of 25,000 at the end of July, MSF said.