Borno: Buhari’s Die-Hard Following Legendary – Garba Shehu

The senior special assistant to the president on media and publicity, Garba Shehu, has stated that President Muhammadu Buhari’s popularity remains unassailable.

Naija News reports that the president’s spokesperson stated this while reacting to Buhari’s recent trip to Borno State.

The president had paid an official visit to the state on Thursday where he assured of his administration’s commitment to restore peace and to ensure that all internally displaced persons (IDPs) are resettled.

Commenting on the visit when he featured on NTA on Monday, Garba Shehu described President Buhari’s following as “legendary”.

“He was there officially to access the security situation in Maiduguri and to commission projects,” Shehu said.

“The governor of Borno state has achieved enormously in terms of delivering projects, education and health, roads and things like that.

“And then, you said optics, because politics is also important. COVID has tested the popularity of leaders all over the world.

“President Buhari has equally been tested and what we saw there in Maiduguri was that the popularity he has is unassailable, the die-hard following is legendary.

“So all of these things came together to give us one of the best outings the president has had in recent times.”

Borno state which is the epicentre of insurgency war in Nigeria has been at the end of incessant deadly attacks by terrorist groups–Boko Haram and the Islamic State West African Province (ISWAP), and many residents have grown frustrated with the Buhari government.

The northeast state is a stronghold of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), which won presidential elections in the state in 2015 and 2019.

Protesters had in February 2020 booed Buhari when he travelled to Maiduguri to “sympathise” with its residents over recent Boko Haram attacks.

A video circulated on social media showed hundreds of protesters on the road while the president’s convoy drove past.

“Buhari, we don’t like you. We don’t want you anymore,” some of the protesters chanted in Hausa.