Johannesburg - Nigeria's former minister of aviation Femi Fani-Kayode has condemned the mysterious death of 150 people in Kano State in the past week and has urged President Muhammadu Buhari to act swiftly or hundreds of thousands of people might die due to the coronavirus (Covid-19) and related diseases.
In a tweet on his Twitter page on Tuesday, Fani-Kayode asked the Nigerian leader to investigate the deaths and find out what caused them.
“What the hell is going on?” he asked.
“If something is not done quickly by President Muhammadu Buhari, hundreds of thousands of people, particularly the elderly, will begin to die of Covid-19 and related diseases in Kano and other parts of the north. In a country of 200 million, we have only tested 10,000. We are playing with fire,” he said.
150 people have died mysteriously in Kano in the last three days.
— Femi Fani-Kayode (@realFFK) April 21, 2020
What the hell is going on?
%%%twitter https://twitter.com/MBuhari?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@MBuharihundreds of thousands of people, particularly the elderly, will begin to die of Covid and related diseases in Kano and other parts of the north. In a country of 200 million we have only tested 10,000? We are playing with fire!
— Femi Fani-Kayode (@realFFK)
Ripples Nigeria reported that Dr Tijjani Hussaini, executive secretary of the Kano State Primary Health-care Board, told journalists that in Kano the medics had yet to verify the claim and the medical cause of the alleged deaths.
Acknowledging that residents in the state were panicking, Hussaini said: “The investigation is prompted by reports that more deaths have been recorded in the past seven days. We want to know the number of persons already dead. We also want to investigate how they died.
“It is when we have a good idea; it is when we get the outcome of the findings that we can properly draw conclusions and brief the public.”
Kano currently has 59 confirmed cases of Covid-19.
The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) said the country has recorded 117 new cases of Covid-19, its highest number in a single day.
The country has recorded a total of 782 cases, with 197 recoveries and 25 deaths.