The politics of the president’s health

Hypocrisy and ignorance wear twin garbs and like the chameleon, you can’t tell which side is the real deal and which one is sham. In our climes, the government in power, the people and the opposition use all for political expediency. When the critique of why Sai Baba should not go to London is premised […]

Hypocrisy and ignorance wear twin garbs and like the chameleon, you can’t tell which side is the real deal and which one is sham. In our climes, the government in power, the people and the opposition use all for political expediency. When the critique of why Sai Baba should not go to London is premised on having budgeted a humongous amount of money for Arse Hole Clinic this year, you wonder what is working there – is it ignorance, mischief or hypocrisy?
Only those who are severely ignorant of budgetary process and procedure could believe that a budget signed into law two months earlier would right all the wrongs of a nation whose president casually laments that it imports common bamboo toothpicks. But then, it could be argued for full measure that a similarly humongous amount was budgeted for this clinic over the years that by now, it should be treating the Queen, Barack Obama and Angela Merkel for a change. If you asked Lai Mohammed why this is not so, he is likely to shout – kwarruption!
If ‘change’ government does the expected, it would still take a while before the magic it is expected to do. While we are waiting, you do not expect the human body to wait until the Clinic is fully functional before it shows signs of weakness. We understand that this year’s fiscal allocation to this one clinic beats the collective allocations of several teaching hospitals in Naija and we hope that the budget answers to its calling in the end. That means that by next year, nobody in government, whether high or low, should have cause to travel outside the country for consultation, diagnosis and treatment of an ailment least of all, the common earache. There is a critical observation here; in 1984, Sai Baba described Naija hospitals as mere consulting clinics; some of us can’t wait to see what adjectives he uses to qualify their state of being in 2016. What more, by the time he ends his term in 2019, we can’t wait to judge him by what ‘changes’ he would have brought to health.
We have knocked off ignorance and mischief, so that leaves hypocrisy as the last man standing. Hypocrisy is sub-divided into two – one on the part of the ‘change’ government and the other on the mockery of its critics. According to media reports, Sai Baba had cancelled medical tourism for all government officials. It was done to reduce foreign exchange wastage on health tourism. It does not necessarily mean that anyone in government who could ‘sign the cheque’ cannot go anywhere to have their health checked, it simply means they aren’t doing it at public expense. It is hypocrisy of the highest order to exclude the president from a directive he issued for a – mere earache.
But then Femi Adeshina who is gradually making the duo of Reuben Apati and Yokosuna look like amateur spin doctors; argued that Sai Baba’s trip to London was purely on a ten-day vacation. We have no reason why he could not have had this vacation at the Mambilla Plateau or the Obudu Cattle Ranch. Now if while on leave this consummate patriot checks into a London ENT clinic, that would be an extraneous circumstance requiring full disclosure. As they say before June 12, we do not know where the truth lies, between the horse’s mouth and the eagle’s beak.
Sai Baba’s pre-departure interview confessed to needing foreign medical intervention. This scenario leaves us with several conjectures – Adeshina was not properly briefed; he is ignorant of happenings to his principal or like Lai Mohammed, he is using a Goebellian public relations practice script.
If Adeshina is fully briefed but chooses to hoodwink the nation, it would be a very serious infraction. The health of the president is of paramount national significance to his citizens on a ‘need to know’ basis. The president looks human. Humans share health unpredictability with their vehicular invention. A vehicle could emerge from a factory with a certified quality check yet end up malfunctioning. That is why Toyota, Ford et al have vehicle recalls, although scarcely in Naija. A 74-year warhorse is susceptible to illness beyond Fayose’s mischievous campaign advertisement and a highly religious albeit spiritually deficient nation would love to enlist in fasting and prayer for their president’s health.
There is something the APC government could do to purge itself of hypocrisy – withdraw the verbal ban on health tourism in favour of a conditional ban; carry out an institutional capacity audit of the health sector and tell us where to get help for what? Then, it should publish a SOS rescue plan for the health sector giving what it plans to do, a timeline within which it hopes to do it with periodic review and then subject itself to public audit when it has completed the task. In case APC is wondering what change means as it affects the health sector, anything short of this would be what its critics tag it – a monumental fraud!