President Muhammadu Buhari called his special adviser on media and publicity, Femi Adesina on phone today, Saturday, to commend him for fighting to finish, those he called ‘mischief makers.’
The President might be referring to many social media practitioners who have been posting negative write ups on him, including the one that said that he was dead or was so sick that he would not be able to return to the country to continue as President.
In his twitter handle, @FemAdesina, the Presidential spokesman confessed that he was glad to hear the voice of his boss when he spoke with “PMB a short while ago.”
The President, he said, thanked him (Adesina) “for holding out against mischief makers. PMB tells me during a phone call today that he would call again soon. (And I gave him best wishes.)”
Adesina said that Buhari also told him that he was resting, but that there was no cause for worry.
He asked me “to greet my family.”
Adesina narrated the phone conversation with President Buhari in his Facebook wall thus:
“At exactly 2.43 p.m today, Saturday, February 25, 2017, my phone rang. Who was at the other end? Tunde Sabiu, personal assistant to President Muhammadu Buhari.
“Hold on for Mr President,” Tunde said.
And in a matter of seconds, the very familiar voice came:
“Femi, how are you?” (He calls me Adesina most times, but today, he opted for Femi)
I screamed : “Mr President, I have missed you. How are you sir?”
He first laughed. That familiar laugh. Then he said: “I am still resting. Thank you for holding out against mischief makers.”
I said it was my duty, the very least I could do, adding how happy I was to speak with him.
“How is your family?”
I said we were fine, and he asked me to extend his greetings to them.
“I hope to call you again, ” Mr President said, and I bade him farewell, adding: “Best wishes, sir.”
It was a defining moment for me. For more than a month, I had always spoken with aides who are with the President in London. Not once did I ask them to take the phone to him, deliberately so, because I didn’t need to speak with him to validate the fact that he was alive. And since he was on vacation, he had a right to his privacy.
Of his own volition, President Buhari spoke with me. It made my day. Even if he hadn’t done so, he would have remained my President, my leader, and my man. Any day.” [myad]
