Tinubu's Health and the Cycle of Secrecy

When President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua left Nigeria for medical treatment in Saudi Arabia on November 23, 2009, I was the Chairman of the Editorial Board of the National Life newspaper. This paper was owned by then Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu, who is now the President of Nigeria.

Official statements said Yar’Adua had acute pericarditis and a chronic kidney problem. What started as a short visit turned into a painful month-long absence. In February 2010, Yar’Adua was secretly brought back to Nigeria at night, avoiding the people he was elected to lead. Just three months later, on May 5, 2010, he passed away, reportedly due to Non-Hodgkin Lymphoma.

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo later denied that he put forward a candidate who was terminally ill. Yet, he admitted he knew about Yar’Adua’s serious health issues before choosing him. Yar’Adua’s health struggles were not a secret. During the presidential campaign in early March 2007, he had a health crisis that required an emergency airlift to Germany.

I remember seeing him during that rough time, just a few seats away. He visited the then governor of Enugu State, looking very frail, with scars from a flesh graft on his left hand. An aide with him carried a bag full of medications. As the man who was both the governor of Katsina State and the PDP presidential candidate spoke, that aide was giving him drugs and water. Who would put someone in such poor health into the stressful job of leading over 200 million people?

As the public grew more worried, Obasanjo arranged a live phone call, asking the famous question, “Umoru, are you dead or alive?” From his hospital bed, Yar’Adua weakly replied, “I am not dead, I am alive.” Yet, weeks before taking office, he was flown back to Germany for emergency treatment. Aso Rock often denied the seriousness of his condition, while political opportunists and fake religious leaders called for national fasting and prayers.

Amid all this, I wrote a piece in my National Life column titled, “Why We Must Neither Fast Nor Pray for Yar’Adua.” I referenced the Yoruba saying: “A kìí jí apiroro, No one wakes the cunning actor who merely simulates sleep.” How could a nation pray for a leader whose close associates lied about his health?

Around that time, Bola Tinubu, the owner of National Life, joined me in questioning the situation with Yar’Adua’s health. He criticized the president, saying, “the country is now drifting and groping in the dark, like a ship without a captain, in a stormy ocean.” Tinubu demanded that Yar’Adua follow Section 145 of the 1999 Constitution by declaring in writing to the National Assembly that Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan should act as President.

Fast forward sixteen years, and now President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is facing the same issue he once condemned. He recently went missing from his duties for 30 days while he traveled in Europe without passing power to the Vice President, breaking the same Section 145 he once criticized.

This sad irony reminds me of the Yoruba saying: “Tí o bá máa sin ègbón rẹ ní ìhòhò, rántí mú àwọn àbúrà rẹ l’ówó, If you intend to strip your elder brother naked at his burial, remember to bring your younger siblings along to witness the horrifying spectacle.” The message is clear: the fairness and integrity you show to others now will come back to you later. Today, Nigerians are suffering from hunger, fuel prices are high, and many are in the hands of kidnappers. Yet Tinubu says he enjoyed his time in Europe and is ready to work.

The worry about the health of Nigerian leaders is a long-standing issue. It goes back beyond the Yar’Adua era, during the military rule of Generals Ibrahim Badamasi Babangida and Sani Abacha. Babangida finally admitted he had a painful spine issue needing treatment in Germany.

Before General Abacha died in June 1998, he looked very sick in public. Investigative reports, especially from TELL magazine, showed his decline. On June 8, 1998, he died inside the Presidential Villa.

Almost twenty years after Abacha, Nigeria faced another round of secrecy with President Muhammadu Buhari. Between 2015 and 2021, Buhari spent many days in hospitals in London for undisclosed illnesses while his aides sent out vague statements that frustrated the public.

In African politics, the health of a sitting president is often kept secret, much like the sacred Ogboni fraternity. But in real democracies, the health of the executive is important for political and economic stability. When a leader cannot perform, it creates a power vacuum and stops good governance.

Financial markets need stability. When a president's health is in question, it causes currency problems and leads to capital flight. Also, in a democracy, a leader’s fitness for office is a public matter. When a leader is unwell, the presidency loses its meaning, and the president becomes just a figurehead.

Experts say that the urge to hide illness comes from traditional African views of royalty. In Yoruba culture, it is taboo to associate a king with weakness or sickness. Admitting a king is ill suggests spiritual weakness, which puts the kingdom at risk.

Because talking about a king’s illness is frowned upon, Yoruba culture uses euphemisms. They say, “Ara Ọba ò dájú”, “The King’s body is not completely firm.” When announcing his death, they say, “Ọba wàjà”, “The King has ascended into the vault.”

In two previous essays I wrote, “The President is a Sick Man: Buhari’s Secret Therapy Inside the ‘Oneida’” and “The President is a Sick Man,” I traced the history of presidential health cover-ups from the 19th century in America to modern Africa. I argued that hidden medical trips disguised as vacations reflect the Yoruba saying, “Ó jọ gáté, kò jọ gàté, ó fi ẹsè méjì tiro gáte-gàte.” This means trying to hide a limp makes it more obvious.

Nigeria's Fourth Republic has a long history of presidential health secrecy, similar to global leaders who tried to govern while hiding their illnesses. Grover Cleveland had secret surgery for cancer; Woodrow Wilson had a stroke hidden by his wife and doctor; Franklin D. Roosevelt concealed heart failure; Winston Churchill kept a stroke quiet; Georges Pompidou hid cancer; François Mitterrand falsified medical reports to hide prostate cancer.

Across Africa, the same mentality is seen in leaders like Peter Mutharika from Malawi, Ali Bongo from Gabon, José Eduardo dos Santos from Angola, and Robert Mugabe from Zimbabwe. Only a few leaders, like President Patrice Talon of Benin, have been transparent about their health.

When Tinubu returned to Lagos from France, a trip his press office called a “working vacation”, a term that does not fit with the Nigerian Constitution, he told reporters he was “ready to kick, ready to work; nothing wrong.” As he said this, I can imagine foreign doctors who might have treated him shaking their heads at the dishonesty of leaders in the Third World. Yoruba elders wisely say: “A kìí mọ Òṣó ju ìyá Òṣó lọ, no one knows the secrets of Ọṣọ better than Ọṣọ’s own mother.” It is pointless to try to wake someone who is pretending to be asleep.

In situations like this, the Yoruba have another saying: three people cannot sit simultaneously in twos. Tinubu’s trip fits a pattern of unannounced stops and evasive public relations. The dangerous tradition of arrogance in power has not changed; it has just been refined, supported by a legislature that acts like a rubber stamp.

The powerful often forget that human health is beyond their control. In the last century, the world has moved from secrecy to transparency. In 1967, the US 25th Amendment made clear rules for passing authority during medical issues. This was used by Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush. Other leaders like Hugo Chávez, Fernando Lugo, and Hage Geingob openly shared their health information with the public.

Why do leaders today, especially in the Third World, hide their health problems? Historically, political aides see illness as a weakness, wrongly believing that hiding it shows strength. The truth is that health is not a privilege of power.

No, they are mistaken! Good health is a divine gift, not something that comes from being in power. When we are healthy, it is a gift from the Creator. We may build hospitals, but we cannot control our own health or stop aging.

Among the Yoruba, they see diseases from two perspectives. One is spiritual. They say a disease is a bad spirit that fights against human life. The second view is that sickness can come from a person's moral failings. These include not following guidance or failing to make the necessary sacrifices as directed by divination.

They also believe that good health is the ultimate treasure. Instead of just being the absence of sickness, it means being balanced physically, socially, and spiritually. If someone has a broken relationship with the divine, the deities, their ancestors, or their community, they will be ill. They also believe health is destiny, and sudden illness is a conflict with one's destiny.

The bottom line is that neither power nor wealth can protect anyone from sickness. Holding a high office does not protect someone from being unwell. In the eyes of the divine, the rich and powerful share the same vulnerabilities as the poor. Acting strong when one is weak, as Third World leaders do, is pointless. When they do this, they do not hide their condition; they only reveal their arrogance.

To show that it is foolish to mock others in their weakness, Sakara music legend Yesufu Olatunji once sang for his friend, the socialite Raimi Ishola. In one of his classic songs, Olatunji defended Ishola against those wishing him harm. I want to change Ishola’s name to President Tinubu’s praise name, Àkànbí, so that this message can last. Olatunji sang: “Who is seeking your harm, Àkànbí?/Who wishes you ill?”

In another line, he sang, “No one kills the dog for barking warnings/Nor does anyone slaughter the ram for butting heads/No one destroys the he-goat for being unruly.” The direct translation is: “Taa ló ń pe’rí ẹ o?/Èmi ò pe’rí ẹ, Àkànbí” and “A kìí t’oríi gbígbó, k’á pa ajá o…/A kìí t’oríí kíkàn k’á pa àgbò…/A kìí t’oríí wérewère pa òbúkọ…”

The song ended with a classic reminder about how Nigerians might be facing masters of deception in their leaders’ health. He sang: “No one plays the Ikoto game with a crafty master, A kìí b’ọlọgbọn ta ìkòto.” Ikoto is a traditional children’s game played with old battery heads, bottle caps, or snail shells.

If President Tinubu were honest with Nigerians about his health issues, he would find a caring public ready to pray for his recovery. Such honesty would show he is neither a god nor superhuman.

No one is. Many of us face such human challenges. Tinubu and Donald Trump are human, like all of us, and their problems are the same as anyone else's. We all deal with the reality of being human, and we will all eventually leave this world, just like flowers lose their petals when their time is up.