WIFE of the Nigeria’s President, Mrs Aisha Buhari, has debunked the report, published by an online news website, Sahara Reporter, that she travelled to the United Kingdom with large entourage and also spending huge amount of tax payer’s money whenever she travelled in the year 2016.
She said this on Friday, explaining that she has never travelled to London with more that her three children, her Aide-De-Camp and her personal physician and there was no occasion the Nigerian High Commission had never catered for her needs during the trips based on her husband’s position that public offices must be separated from the private lives of the occupants.
Mrs Buhari said this in a statement signed by her Special Assistant on Media, Adebisi Olumide-Ajayi.
The statement read: “The Nigerian Commission in London has never offered any favour, either monetarily or materially, to her (the President’s wife) or her so-called entourage on any of her trips to London.
“The State House in Abuja caters for her meal when necessary, and other healthy food or variety needed by her children are her personal responsibility.”
She stated further that going by her husband’s campaign, she has never requested for any flamboyant or extravagant reception, or complain of the Commission not doing the necessary reception accorded to her predecessor.
“It is on record that the Nigerian Commission in London does not receive Aisha Buhari at the airport with any official distinction or privileges as was accorded other first ladies before her.
“She has never complained or raised dust about any of these acts by the High Commission because of the understanding, as clearly spelled out and practised by her husband, that public office must be separated from the private lives of the occupants. Also “Her drivers are privately arranged without any recourse to the embassy staff.
“She has always been an advocate of good governance where officials of government are responsive and appealing to their constituents. It therefore baffles the imagination that one could believe she would collaborate with any government official, however highly placed, either at home or abroad, to shortchange the Nigerian people,” the release explained.
Mrs Buhari asked the authors of the report or any member of staff of the High Commission to provide evidence to contradict this position as it concerns her trips to London.
She said they should come up with the true position of things as it concerns her London trips, if not for her reputation and that of her family, then for the sake of good Nigerians who deserve to know the truth at all times on when she spent at least £7,000 on hospitality whenever she visits the UK.
