By Muyiwa Adetiba

I really don’t understand the noise about our President taking a medical time out. We knew, or should know, what we signed in for when we elected a septuagenarian as our President. He may have looked lean and trim during the campaign. He may even have been fit for his age. But 70 is not 50, and it would be an unusual 70 year old who would not have health issues.

In any case, any responsible person who is fifty plus should have a regular medical check–up. And anybody, 50 or less who wants to pace himself for optimum performance should take his leave seriously. I therefore consider all the hullabaloo surrounding the medical leave an unnecessary distraction. The presidency should be commended if anything, on the orderly way it transferred power. It was a gesture of seamlessness, trust and continuity.

The only reason highbrows should be raised is if it was more than a routine medical check-up as announced. Or if, come Monday, he is not at his desk. In order words, we need to know if the President is facing a life-threatening illness or one that could incapacitate him in any way.

The President being human, should be expected to be sick at some point. He also has every reason to take care of his health. But then so do the rest of us because our lives are as important to us and our close families as his life is to him and his close family. Unfortunately, the President and members of the political elite have medical options that are denied the rest of us.

They can go to the best hospitals anywhere in the world. We can’t. And our hospitals at home are in such a state that they are no longer consulting clinics—because many of the good consultants are no longer there—but half way mortuaries. I wonder, I really wonder, what it would take to have seven new, or upgraded professionally managed medical centres of excellence in the country. Apart from what we would save in FX, we would save lives, generate employment and also bring national pride to the country.

I am sure a lot of our medical professionals in the Diaspora would gladly participate if there was a seriousness of purpose on the part of government. I feel ashamed for the country and the leaders themselves who are in a position to make a difference when they rush abroad for routine medical check-up and treatment for illnesses like ear infection, leg infection and so on.

Apart from the obvious security implication of our President being treated abroad, what respect does that fact accord him or the country? He is not alone. In fact, almost all our political leaders and top civil servants have personal doctors abroad. It is therefore routine—to our shame and embarrassment—to hear foreign medical treatments being used as reasons for bail applications in our courts. People who steal money that could have been used to build good hospitals don’t deserve to be granted bail so they can go abroad for treatment.

I honestly look forward to the day when we would have a courageous, committed and visionary leader who would ban foreign treatment for certain classes of ailments for all Nigerians, especially government officials. Let us all learn to treat ourselves or die in the process. It is also a cause for concern that our President chooses to recuperate in the UK according to the photographs that went viral. Couldn’t he have found a place anywhere in the country, particularly in the south for political reasons, where he could recuperate? Couldn’t he have used that as a little tourist message?

That said, I believe those who concocted and pushed the false news of his death belong to the lows of the low. The publishers who helped to disseminate this wicked news without fact checking are reckless and irresponsible. The urchins in the social media who glee at the death of a President and a father figure need help. I mean that seriously. The amount of venom and hatred that oozes out in the social media under the guise of anonymity is frightening.

If it is a barometer to gauge the thinking of our youths then its readings are alarming and worrisome. It is understandable that the President would have many enemies. After all, millions did not vote for him. And many of those millions took his victory personal. His actions, if not his policies since he took over have not exactly endeared him to them.

Added to that, is the fact that many Christians, north or south of the country, who voted for him before might not do so if elections were to be held today. But to wish him dead? He is someone’s father and husband for goodness sake! A Yoruba proverb translates roughly ‘that we quarrel should not be unto death.’ Death is so disruptive; so final that nobody should wish it on his worst enemy. The only plausible reason I can adduce for our cavalier attitude to death is that death has become too common in this part of the world. Just look around you. There is death, preventable death everywhere.

While we were contending with the carnage of the Boko Haram adherents who slaughter human beings like rams, the Fulani herdsmen came on the scene to unleash what can only be described as mindless violence. These agents of destruction have moved from village to village, maiming and killing. Yet the State seems powerless. These criminals in the name of Fulani herdsmen have become ghosts that cannot be apprehended and brought to justice. On top of this came the eruption in Kaduna where wanton destruction and hundreds of preventable deaths took place.

Again, the perpetuators have become ghosts that cannot be apprehended. These deaths and the failure of government to contain them, are threatening the unity of the country and exacerbating religious and ethnic fault lines in the country. It is worth repeating that poverty, religion, ethnicity and injustice are fuels for chaos and disorder.

The President must address firmly, the various killings around the country. Every death is a painful loss to someone because everybody has a root. The President must move the earth if necessary to safeguard the lives of its citizens. All lives matter. These killings must stop.

I hope he has had a good rest because he has a lot of work to do; not only on the economy, but also on the religious and social fabric of the country. May God grant him the health and the will to set the country on the path of justice, equity and religious harmony.