Check out these quotes:

"Senator Ekweremadu said “but interestingly, the matter also came up during the discussion with the Council of Foreign Relations. They looked forward to a specific answer from me but I took time to explain to them the issues concerning life and death in Africa. For us, life is sacrosanct and we deal with life very respectfully."

COMMENT: I understand what he is trying to say here, but to claim that " life is sacrosanct and we deal with life very respectfully" on a continent with multiple countries killing off its own people by the hundreds daily, and where preventable natural and human disasters do the rest, is trying the height of ignorance.


“Beyond that, matters concerning president’s illness is something that is handled with utmost care, not just in Nigeria but all over the world, including America. As I took turn to explain to them, I gave them a brief history of presidential ailments across the globe and how countries have been quite reluctant to ease out a sitting president on account of ill health."


COMMENT: Anybody have an opinion on his second quote i.e. countries"unwilling to ease out presidents for ill health".

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Tribune-From Taiwo Adisa, Lanre Adewole and Adewale Ajayi - 04.12.2009

THE concern over the health of President Umaru Yar’Adua is fast spreading beyond the shores of Nigeria, as the United States is said to be worried about the president.


According to information reaching the Nigerian Tribune, the United States is particularly bothered about the likely implications the Yar’Adua’s health would have on Nigeria’s fledgling democracy, especially against the current controversies over who should succeed him in the event of his resignation.


The Deputy Senate President, Senator Ike Ekwe-remadu, who confirmed the fears of the United States to newsmen in Abuja, said the US congressmen pointedly told him of their concern over the health of President Yar’Adua.


Ekweremadu just returned to the country after a trip to the United States of America, where his Committee on Constitution Review met with the US Congress Committee on Foreign Relations.


Senator Ekweremadu said “but interestingly, the matter also came up during the discussion with the Council of Foreign Relations. They looked forward to a specific answer from me but I took time to explain to them the issues concerning life and death in Africa. For us, life is sacrosanct and we deal with life very respectfully.


“Beyond that, matters concerning president’s illness is something that is handled with utmost care, not just in Nigeria but all over the world, including America. As I took turn to explain to them, I gave them a brief history of presidential ailments across the globe and how countries have been quite reluctant to ease out a sitting president on account of ill health.


“So Nigeria is not the first country where we have a president that is ill while in office. It happened across the world and I am not aware of any of such circumstances where the president was forced to resign or pushed out of office.”


Meanwhile, some state governors met on Thursday, ostensibly to apprise themselves of the latest reports on Yar’Adua’s health. The meeting, which was held at the Kwara State Lodge, Asokoro, Abuja, was attended by most of the governors, who started arriving in Abuja from 5.00 p.m.


The Kwara State governor, Dr. Bukola Saraki, was one of the top government functionaries who visited Saudi Arabia last week to see the president. However, information in the media indicated that the team of well-wishers did not see the president, who was said to have been taken into the intensive care unit of King Faisal Specialist Hospital in Jeddah.


The source, however, said Saraki, the chairman of the Governors’ Forum, would brief his colleagues on the reports he received from members of the presidential team in Saudi Arabia.


Besides the Thursday meeting, a source also said a meeting involving governors and Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan would hold today, ostensibly to discuss the same matter.


Meanwhile, the Action Congress (AC) has said the stand of the Federal Executive Council on President Yar’Adua’s health is unprincipled, self-serving and predictable.


The AC, in a statement issued in Lagos on Thursday by its national publicity secretary, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, said the FEC had vindicated its call for constitutional reform, which would ensure a more effective way of handling issue of national importance.


“As we said before, there is nothing in the antecedents of the present FEC to indicate that it can put national interest above individual considerations in dealing with an issue that has jolted the polity more than any other issue in recent times.


“FEC’s contention that the government is running properly in the absence of the president and with no one in charge is the biggest joke of the year; it shows that the members do not have the interest of Nigerians at heart,’’ the statement read.


The party said it would have been surprised if the FEC, the only body constitutionally mandated to initiate a probe of the presi-dent’s health, had acted otherwise.


The AC highlighted misguided loyalty and enlightened self-interest as the reasons FEC could not be decisive at a time that called for nothing but uncommon courage.


It noted that FEC members were all appointees of the president, who, they believed, they owed their lofty positions to his benevolence rather than competence.


The party said “if FEC kick-starts a process that throws up a successor to the ailing president, how are they sure the new president will retain them? These are the issues on the mind of this FEC.”


It called on the government and the presidency to immediately initiate a process of daily media briefing on the state of the president’s health so as to stem rumour mongering and keep Nigerians informed.

only reason y US cares is the Oil. Otherwise Nigeria could crash and Burn and Us wont do a dammthing.


Look at Dafur, Dafur has no oil or anything for the US, so no Us concerns

No mind them,,why are they worried over the affairs on nigeria, The us dont sow where they wont reap and now that one of their business empire is about to crumble,they are raising false alarm, Hypocrites