The
Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed has reacted to
recent claims by some news sources that President Buhari was rushed to a
hospital in London.
President Muhammadu Buhari
On Wednesday, news circulated that President Muhammadu Buhari was
rushed to Kings Hospital in the United Kingdom on a life support machine
following a serious illness.
The Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed has
reacted to the news. In a statement issued on Wednesday in Abuja, the
minister urged Nigerians to disregard the subversive messages being
circulated via text messaging and the social media, saying the
fabricated messages are being orchestrated by those who feel threatened
by the emerging order.
According to News Agency of Nigeria, Mohammed said there is no iota
of truth in the messages being circulated on the health of the
President, who is hale and hearty, and the purported emergency meetings
of the State Governors in Abuja or anywhere.
He said the naysayers have also resorted to the use of ethnicity
and religion as tools to divide Nigerians, overheat the polity and cause
panic among the citizenry, in addition to using fake news and
disinformation to distort government activities.
Alhaji Mohammed said while opposition and criticism are all part of
democracy, the crafting and circulation of subversive materials and
scare-mongering are not, hence the full wrath of the law will be
brought to bear on those who are bent on subverting the state.
”The source/sources of the fabricated messages are already
being investigated and the authors should prepare to face the
consequences of their actions.
”The emerging trend of resorting to destabilisation and
scare-mongering is not unexpected, considering this government’s
clamp-down on the corrupt elements in the society, the plugging of all
financial leaks which has derailed the gravy train of the looters of
public treasury and the enthronement of probity and transparency in the
polity.
”While we will neither stifle press freedom nor abridge the
citizens’ right to express themselves freely, whether through criticism
or protests, the security agencies will neither allow any resort to
violence nor a willful subversion of the state for whatever reason,” he warned.
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