N10bn Ebola fund unspent, APC campaign council slams Atiku

File photo: Minister of Solid Minerals Development, Dele Alake.

The All Progressives Congress Presidential Campaign Council on Thursday said the N10bn President Bola Tinubu approved in June for the Ebola emergency remains untouched.

It said the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, the Federal Airports Authority of Nigeria and other agencies have been spending other available resources on surveillance.

In a statement signed Thursday by its spokesperson, Dele Alake, the council was responding to the African Democratic Congress presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, who had asked how the money had been spent after Nigeria confirmed its first Ebola case.

The council said the title of Atiku’s statement linked the President’s first name to Ebola, which it said risked “turning a serious health concern into a vehicle to ridicule the President.”

In a statement on Wednesday by the Director of Strategic Communication of his campaign council, Phrank Shaibu, Atiku demanded the publication of how much of the N10bn had been disbursed and when.

“Where is the money?” he asked, adding that “a press statement cannot replace an audit.”

He said the government did not confirm the case until October 20, nine days after the patient sought care, and that 44 close contacts had been left unmonitored.

He also said he was alarmed by information that the health minister’s press conference was meant to discourage Nigerians from attending campaign rallies and voting.

In its response, however, the APC campaign council said Atiku’s statement “showed patent ignorance” about the virus and about why the traveller from Uganda was not detected on arrival at the Abuja airport.

“For anyone infected with the virus, the incubation period ranges from two to 21 days, with symptoms typically appearing eight to 10 days after exposure.

“An infected person cannot spread or transmit Ebola to others until they actively develop symptoms.

“This is why it took the infected Nigerian some days before reporting to the hospital, where several tests showed that the person had Ebola,” it said.

The council praised the agencies for what it called robust surveillance at entry points, which it said tipped off the government about the index case and led to the tracing of the patient’s 44 contacts.

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It argued that “A responsible opposition will applaud the task force for being responsive, but the Atiku camp always goes for cheap shots at the government.”

The campaign council also described Atiku’s claim that the ministerial briefing was meant to discourage rally attendance or voting as speculative, saying he could not make such a serious allegation “without verifiable evidence, especially in the thick of electioneering.”

It said the briefing did not raise the issue, except to appeal to the public to comply with the Presidential Task Force’s protocol.

It advised Atiku and those it called “his hirelings” to avoid politicising public health, adding that the opposition should rally around health authorities and follow the task force’s advice “to ensure Ebola does not become a national epidemic.”

The Presidency said Tinubu had on June 9 “ordered the immediate release of N10bn” to strengthen the NCDC’s preparedness and the national emergency response, and set up a task force chaired by Chief of Staff, Femi Gbajabiamila.

On Tuesday, the Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Prof Ali Pate, announced that a laboratory had confirmed Ebola in a woman who recently returned from Uganda.

Her symptoms began on October 7, and she sought care at a private hospital on October 11.

After an emergency meeting of the task force at the Villa on Wednesday, Gbajabiamila credited the work of the Presidential Task Force on Ebola Preparedness for the quick detection of Nigeria’s index Ebola case, assuring Nigerians that it could handle the disease.

Pate had told our correspondent that the government was working with Uganda, which is battling its own outbreak, and was tracing the case’s contacts to stop the virus from spreading.

He explained, “All I can tell you is that we are collaborating with our sister African nation of Uganda. What is important is that we have found this one case.

“We are doing contact tracing, and we are putting containment measures to ensure that it doesn’t go into our population.”

Tinubu is seeking reelection at the presidential polls on January 16, 2027 and will commence his campaign in Kaduna on Saturday.