I don't need to speak to Pres Buhari directly to authenticate his health status- Femi Adesina says

Wednesday, 22 February 2017

Senior Special Adviser to President Buhari on Media and Publicity, Femi Adesina, says he does not need to speak with President Buhari directly to aunthenticate his health status.

In an interview with Channels TV this morning, Adesina maintained that he gets all the information about President Buhari from those around him including his personal physician, PA and domestic staff.

"All those I speak with, his personal physician, his PA, his domestic aide, I can tell them to take the phone to Mr President and knowing Mr President, he will speak with me but I have decided not to because I do not need that phone conversation to authenticate the health of Mr President. There is enough authentication. There is one from the aacting president, there is from the senate president, there is from the speaker of the House of Representatives and many others and the President himself in the communication yesterday said no cause for worry, no cause for alarm. So I do not need to authenticate the state of health of Mr President by asking to speak with him. If he says let me speak with Adesina, I will speak with him. But I don not need to go out of my way to say I must speak with him"he said

Adesina mainatined that all the information he has sent out to Nigerians about President Buhari are from third party sources

"That is correct. I never claimed that it was direct. Never at any time did I claim it was direct from him. The last time I came here, I told you that I speak with people around him everyday and that is the position. As at yesterday, I still spoke with those people". 

Asked if he is sure that the information given to him by the third party individuals is true, Adesina said "It depends on the kind of peson you are speaking for. If I know that I speaking for a shifty and sneaky fellow, then I will not trust what is communicated to me. But I know the person I am speaking for. I know he is straightforward. This is a President that does not want you to color anything on his behalf. We that are his personal aides, we are like family. We are not only friends. We are colleagues and all that. I believe what is transmitted to me 100%".

On whether he can schedule a 5-minutes interview with president Buhari so that he can speak to Nigerians, Adesina said "Yes we can always raise it with Mr President but don't forget that the ultimate decision will be that of Mr President. I can recommend, I can tell him that it is needful to do this at this point in time. He will either say yes or no". 

On why he didn't go with President Buhari to the UK, he said "When Mr President left, it was considered a private trip. It was a vacation, it was a holiday. You don't need your media man during a holiday. That was why I stayed back. If I was there, of course, the strategy may have been different".