Buhari returns: what exactly is Nigeria celebrating with this public holiday Monday?

Nigerians play too much, I swear. When I heard that various states were proposing a public holiday to celebrate the hale and hearty return of President Muhammadu Buhari, I initially thought it was a joke. Not go to work ke? How else are we to offset the ginormous medical bill the president had run up in seeking treatment in countries that had put their own health care infrastructure first and foremost?Would sitting at home pay for the bill of parking a jet in the UK for over a hundred days?

I thought someone was having a laugh. Perhaps one of those savage tweets we get to read more and more these days that prove more than anything the seething anger and frustration of the average Nigerian. Who do us dis tin? Are we destined to celebrate mediocrity, iranu and abasha? No, it couldn’t be true!

But nope, it’s true. There will be hordes of people – possibly the entire nation – sitting at home today because Buhari is back. Even Kogi state!!! That belaboured place! Even they are going to sit at home. Choi. Ajekun iya la n’je n’ilu yen. We just siddon dey chop suffer on top of suffer.

I don’t mean the president any harm, and I’m glad he is well enough to see another day in the loving bosom of family, friends and cohorts. Nature abhors a vacuum and it would only have been a matter of time before nefarious agents started to agitate for the First Seat. I also think Osinbajo did a cracking job of keeping the peace and even governing for the short term that he had to assume the position.

But Buhari coming home from receiving medical treatment is nothing to take a whole day off to celebrate. And if some sycophants had deemed it so, his first presidential declaration should have been to overturn it. This is nothing to be proud of: that the one man who could command the highest level of health care a country has to offer instead has to seek treatment outside these shores. His trip is indictment on us as a nation; this solitary act showing the dire condition that millions of Nigerians who have zero to limited access to ANY type of healthcare are in. This should be a day of sober reflection and possibly even mourning. The once giant of Africa should hang her head in shame, not roll out the bunting and jump for joy.

Buhari, doh o. Welcome back. How body? Hope say everything don tanda kakaraka now? Wehdone sah. Please could you get to work now? Thank you.