By Rotimi Akinwumi
Snr Correspondent, Abuja
The controversy generated by the alleged ill-health of the Presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), General Muhammadu Buhari, continued yesterday as the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) demanded that Buhari should openly jog round a stadium to prove that he’s healthy.
Director of Media and Publicity of the PDP Presidential Campaign Organisation, Femi Fani-Kayode, at a press conference in Abuja yesterday said the secrecy surrounding the health status of Buhari is a major concern to the ruling party and as such the opposition candidate must prove to Nigerians he’s healthy and capable of being the president of the country.
However, the All Progressives Congress (APC) has lampooned the PDP for allegations of ill-health against Buhari, saying the medical statement allegedly showing that the retired general is battling prostrate cancer was actually forged.
Fani-Kayode at the press conference noted that it behoves on Buhari to prove to Nigerians he’s healthy so that what happened during the late President Umaru Yar”Adua will not repeat itself.
His words: “The health status of General Muhammadu Buhari has now become a major issue and it gives us cause for concern.
“We are not impressed at the fact that his campaign organisation and his political party have tried to speak for him on this matter and we would prefer that General Buhari himself clears the air and tells the Nigerian people himself that he is not mortally ill.
“The rumour that he is suffering from prostrate cancer is exceptionally worrying and it is incumbent upon each and everyone of us to pray for him if this rumour is true.
“Once again, we wish to emphasise the fact that it is vital that we have full disclosure about the status of his health.
“This is made all the more important given our recent history.
“The truth is that the Nigerian people deserve to know the truth before they make their choice about who they will vote for as their President in February.
“The days of hiding things like a presidential candidate’s health status from the Nigerian public are long over and we would urge General Buhari to acknowledge this.
“In this day and age, nothing ought to be swept under the carpet.
“We are therefore constrained to urge him to prove to the Nigerian people that he really is as ‘’fit as a fiddle’’, as the spokesman of his Presidential Campaign Organisation has said, by taking a brisk walk or even jogging around the perimeter of the stadium before any of his rallies.
“If he can do that, it will go a long way to allay the fears of many.
“Meanwhile we wish him journey mercies as he travels out of the country for his medical check-up”.
But the APC presidential campaign organisation in a statement issued by its Director of Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu said it is shameful for the PDP to circulate “a scam medical report on General Muhammadu Buhari.”
The APC campaign organization lampooned the ruling party over the controversial medical report saying “it is ludicrous for the PDP to throw all cautions to the wind in its shameless effort to pull wool over the eyes of Nigerians over their rising desire for change of guard at the federal government.”
Garba Shehu, in the statement particularly directs the attention of Nigerians to the errors on the letterhead paper conveying the purported medical report, which wrongly identifies the institution as Ahmadu Bello Teaching Hospital instead of Ahmadu Bello University Teaching Hospital (ABUTH) as the Zaria-based teaching hospital is known.
He went further to accuse the PDP of abandoning governance and focusing on frivolities while the nation collapses under its watch.
The statement reads: “The attention of the APC Presidential Campaign Organisation has been brought to the circulation of a fake medical record of General Muhammadu Buhari.
“We are able to track the circulation of the post on a social media platform and we know that the information emanated from the Facebook handle of one of Governor Ayo Fayose’s aides.
“It is noteworthy that the authorities at the Ahmad Bello University Teaching Hospital (ABUTH) have given a clean bill on General Buhari’s health status.
“It is also noteworthy for Nigerians to understand that the PDP will stop at nothing to cast aspersion on the person of General Buhari.
“We knew that the PDP would become unbridled at a point in its desperation to avert the defeat coming its way in the count down to the February 14 presidential election, but to anticipate that the PDP would go as dirty as spreading falsehood on an individual’s state of health could not have been imaginable.
“What is important is that Nigerians know today that our country is not healthy. They know that the PDP has driven the country to a near state of comatose.
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