Senior Special Adviser to President Muhammadu Buhari, Mr Femi
Adesina, has defended the President’s decision to cancel the Federal
Executive Council Meeting on Wednesday. A statement by Mr Adesina
in the morning announced the decision but gave no reason for the
cancellation of the meeting which would have been the first attended by
the President after his return from a more-than-100 days medical
vacation.
Asked about the decision in a telephone interview on
Channels Television’s Politics Today, the presidential spokesman said
there was nothing to it and that concerns about its implications were
uncalled for.
“There is no law that says the Federal Executive
Council meeting should hold every week. There is no law that says it
must be weekly. Under a past administration, it used to hold once every
two weeks,” he said.
“So, there is no law that says it should
hold every Wednesday. It depends on what you have on the agenda to
discuss. The President is the Chairman of that meeting. So, he has the
discretion to hold or not to hold (the meeting).”
President
Buhari’s decision to cancel the meeting had led to more questions about
his fitness to resume work and carry out his duties effectively.
On
Tuesday, news that he would be working from home because rodents had
damaged items in his office and that it was under renovation caused a
stir and went viral on the social media.
But Mr Adesina dismissed
the concerns, saying that the President is strong enough to perform his
duties and that the office in his home and the one in his office
complex were only a short distance apart in any case.
“The fact
that FEC does not hold in one week does not mean anything significant
because the President has the discretion to hold or not to hold FEC
(meetings),” he said.
Asked if the cancellation of Wednesday’s
meeting meant that FEC would no longer be meeting weekly, he said it
wasn’t the case, before going on to say that the meeting had not held
every week over time in the first case.
“That is not correct. It
did not hold every week; when this administration began, it did not hold
every week. And right from then, it had been understood that the FEC
would hold as often as there are things to discuss,” Mr Adesina said.
Had
today’s FEC meeting held and the President attended, it would have been
the first he would be presiding over in more than three months.
Vice President Yemi Osinbajo who was the Acting President while he was away presided over the weekly meeting in his absence.
Professor Osinbajo also presided over the FEC meetings that the President missed before travelling to London.