Huriwa lashes out at Buhari and Osinbajo for attending UN meeting and queen's funeral at the same time

CIVIL society group Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (Huriwa) has lashed out at the government for allowing both President Muhammadu Buhari and vice president Professor Yemi Osinbajo to be away from the country at the same time.

Today, Professor Osinbajo will attend a banquet of world leaders in London before joining them tomorrow morning at the funeral of Queen Elizabeth II. President Buhari for his part, will be away from the country for 10 days as he leaves today for New York to attend the United Nations General Assembly.

Lamenting the fact that both leaders are away at the same time, Huriwa has described their combined absence as disconcerting, saying it showed that the nation has been on autopilot since 2015.Huriwa also stated that the decision was a drain on Nigeria's resources at a time of hyperinflation and a worrying state of insecurity.

According to Huriwa, this shows that the current administration does not care about the well-being and welfare of the populace and the leaders are simply out to satisfy their insatiable taste for globetrotting and epicurean tendencies. Huriwa particularly carpeted President Buhari, saying both ceremonial events would not positively or constructively contribute any solution to the economic and security challenges facing Nigeria.

Huriwa also pointed out that the Nigerian constitution did not envisage a situation such as this when both leaders will abdicate their duties for some days to attend to ceremonial events. According to the human rights group, the constitution expected that either the president or his vice must be on ground in Nigeria at every point in time.

To make it point, Huriwa stated that if the president loved his nation more than pursuing his passion for globetrotting, he could have asked the vice president to stay back in Nigeria and attend both events himself. Several world leaders like President Joe Biden of the US for instance, are currently in London but will fly out after the funeral to attend the United Nations gathering.

A Huriwa spokesman said: “We are beginning to believe that President Muhammadu Buhari is scared of joining other invitees to the Queen’s funeral in a bus ride to the venue. There is no reason both the president and his vice will disappear from Nigeria at the same time.

"From the word go, they haven’t been in the right frame of minds to provide quality leadership but have all these while governed Nigeria in an autopilot way. This is why armed non-state actors are causing unprecedented commotion and bloody insecurity all across the country and inflation has ballooned out of control at over 20%."