Covid -19: Govt deceives international community, citizens with press conf., group

Stanley Ihedigbo

Human Rights, Liberty Access, and Peace Defenders Foundation (HURIDE), has said, Federal and State governments in Nigeria lacked creative approach to the management of Covid-19 pandemic, but embarks in press conferences to deceive international community as well as citizens.

Speaking in a press conference, Chairman Board of Trustees (BoT) , HURIDE, High Chief Uzor A. Uzor, said that because of the “hollowness, emptiness and wickedness of Nigeria’s political class” that denied the country the much needed development.

He lamented that Federal and State Governments have been dishing out measures to curb the spread of Covid-19 which included total lockdown but woefully failed to provide stimulus to cushion the effect of the measures.

“Our leaders have no proactive and creative measures except intermittent press conferences aimed at deceiving international community and their citizens to the effect that they were on top of the situation.

“The measures announced were “punitive, obnoxious, ostentatious and meant to suffer Nigerians especially those that are in the bottom rung of the society. Not all the states have equipped quarantine or isolation centres, no medical personnel,no laboratory testing centers, no drugs and other essential items that would help the victims of the pandemic, rather they were busy addressing press conferences.

“Recall that the only imported medical equipment now was the only one donated by JACK MA. It is just God that sustains us. There is nothing on the ground anywhere. They issue orders to close down schools, markets, churches, offices”, he further lamented.

He added that many Nigerians are aware that their leaders are not sincere but they only put their trust in God.

Government hospital Nigeria

HURIDE boss said that in United States of America (USA), Europe,Italy and China which locked down, there were stimulus for the citizens like government’s payment of all categories of wages of workers as well as supplying them food to their homes.

Food stimulus in China

He added that some governors resorted to fire brigade approach and these have exposed the “incompetence and unpreparedness of the political leaders” to emergency situations, lamenting that there was no coordinated way of combating the virus from Federal to State Governments and it is the people who are ultimately suffering as usual.

“It is unfortunate, that various governments are locking down but they have not even paid workers salary for the month of March. We lack leaders who have the political will to move this country forward. This pandemic has exposed the weakness of our leaders, unfortunately, most of them imported this virus because they travel abroad every other week but they have failed to build their own country and states so that it can attract other people.

“We challenged our political leaders to use this period of Coronavirus pandemic to engage in soul searching to reposition this country. They should now use the period of this pandemic to decide to build and equip hospitals. This should be a lesson to our leaders who rush to Europe, America and India for medical tourism to invest hugely in healthcare delivery”

“In confronting this pandemic, our political leaders should remember that there are the “poor and down-trodden who survive on daily economy. These people constitute a large chunk of the society so that the effect of the measures to combat the virus would not be more devastating than the pandemic itself”.

Uzor said that the Governors who collect nothing less than N1.5b to N3b security votes every month should make it available to tackle this pandemic including paying the poor this period.

The group lamented that the South East Governors are more disorganised and insensitive than other zones governors, lamenting that the dead coronavirus patient in Enugu State who later tested negative was killed by State Government which dumped him in a bush in the name of quarantine centre and the state government should be held accountable and liable and the governor should publicly apologize in three national newspapers as well as provide the family with N500 million as a statutory compassion fund for the family.