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‘Yar’Adua’s
heart can’t withstand second term’
By AZOMA CHIKWE
Monday, November 30, 2009
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•Photo:
Sun News Publishing |
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President Umaru Yar’Adua literally and metaphorically does
not have a heart for a second term in office. While impatient politicians
and political pundits continue to make permutations on a post Yar’Adua
presidency as well as what the incumbent president’s second
term in office would look like, the usually calculative president
has yet to tell anyone that he’s interested in seeking re-election.
Although those close to him insist he is more intent on delivering
on his subsisting mandate, it has not stopped political jobbers
from launching an elaborate campaign for his re-election in 2011.
However, medical experts told Daily Sun at the weekend that even
if Yar’Adua has a wish for re-election, his heart is hardly
in a position to withstand the rigour.
In reaction to the thought-provoking trend in the president’s
health, a consultant cardiologist in Lagos said the president’s
speculated bid for a second term in office has turned him into a
patient living on a borrowed time, adding that there is a pressing
need for the president to take things a lot easier than his strong
individual will is willing to take.
The who preferred anonymity stressed that a lot of emphasis should
be placed on preventive and primary care cardiology by promoting
healthy heart and risk assessment evaluation, which Yar’Adua’s
tight schedule as president will constitute a hindrance.
“He will need aggressive and follow-up management of established
case of heart disease and secondary care which he may not have enough
time for because of his office. The president would also need prompt
and timely intervention in case he presents with acute coronary
syndrome such as heart attack which his busy schedule may be a stumbling
block to.”
He therefore advised the president to prayerfully complete his first
term in office and, concerning second term, he should consider life
first before power, going by his declining health condition.
Corroborating, consultant surgeon, Dr Emmanuel Enabulele stated
that health-wise, anybody urging Yar’Adua to go for a second
term is not doing him a favour, because according to him, it is
impossible for Yar’Adua’s deteriorating health to withstand
a second term. He, however, said the president would throw in the
towel on his own when the time comes without anyone forcing him.
Enabulele said, “Health-wise, anybody that is telling him
to go for a second term, that is not just possible. Anybody that
is trying to force him into a second term is not doing him a favour.
If he wants to give it a try, medically he is praying for the consequences.
It is left for him to make the decision.
“It is not advisable. Can he even cope with the stress of
the campaign? First time around, was he able to cope with the stress
of the campaign? Obasanjo was the one campaigning for him and dragging
him along. And in-between the campaigns, while a presidential campaign
is going on, the candidate is not even there, he is in a hospital.
Then now his health has deteriorated over a period of four years,
leading to even complication, you want him to run? Unless he will
just sit in his house, people will campaign for him, organize the
vote for him and make him president. But he is not the person that
can go through electioneering, if the playing field is level for
everybody. Again, can his deteriorating health withstand the rigorous
of presidency for another four years?
On his advice for Mr. president as an expert, Enabulele was reluctant
and later volunteered: “Advice? You know in this environment
in which we live, people don’t like honest and sincere advice.
Very soon, you see those who don’t even wish him well, but
because of the political patronage they are getting, they want him
to hang in there.
“If you say retire now, so many things come into play, who
is going to take his position, of course, there is constitutional
provision for that. And more horse-trading, mudslinging and all
sorts of things will come in. But medically speaking, I think he
needs some rest, he needs some rest, for a time. He can proceed
on medical leave or annual leave or whatever, and then he will be
fully assessed and see whether he can still be at the centre, by
the time he comes back. He will be the one that will make the natural
decision, nobody will tell him, when to throw in the towel.
“I think the transition will be made a little bit more politically
and environmentally friendly. But this is not the time to say you
must go, you shouldn’t go. The cause of the pericarditis,
and progression or retrogression will eventually, and nobody will
be telling him, he will be the one to make the decision.
Continuing, the surgeon said, “you know that in this country,
once a party is in power, irrespective of the person that is thrown
up for the post, the party, will eventually win, the peoples’
votes don’t count. In advanced countries, by now, the matter
would have been settled. People would have sat down and said, this
president is not capable of keeping his job, his health has so much
deteriorated, and they would have known the right thing to do,”
he said.
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