Fayemi’s wife, EXCO members, aides go for COVID-19 test

Few hours after Governor Kayode Fayemi of Ekiti State tested positive for coronavirus, his wife, Bisi, and top government functionaries have undergone tests to determine their status.

The Chief Press Secretary to the Governor, Yinka Oyebode, made this known on Wednesday in Ado-Ekiti.

According to Oyebode, Erelu Fayemi, being the closest person to the governor, and other members of the State Executive Council, including himself, and other personal aides of the governor have submitted themselves for COVID-19 test.

“Samples have been taken and we are now expecting the results. But none of us is symptomatic as of now; so no cause for alarm,” he said.

The News Agency of Nigeria reports that this is coming just as members of the state COVID-19 Task Force, of which the governor is the chairman, officially announced that he had tested positive for the virus.

The state Commissioner for Information, Muyiwa Olumilua, said government decided to break the news to the public as a responsible administration that believed no information about the governor should be hoarded from the people of the state.

Speaking during the regular news briefing by the task force in Ado Ekiti, Olumilua said Fayemi had gone on self-isolation and would be attending to official duties from home.

“Ordinarily, we are not supposed to do this because the governor had broken the news on his twitter handle, but as a responsible government, we owe it a duty to do this officially,” he said.

Olumilua said the governor would be attending to official duties from home, while issues that would require his physical presence would be delegated to his deputy, Chief Bisi Egbeyemi.

The commissioner urged the people of the state not to panic over the governor’s medical condition.

Also speaking, the state Commissioner for Health, Dr. Mojisola Yaya-Kolade, said the molecular laboratory, established by government, had tested 1,000 persons in five local government areas of the state.

The commissioner added that the state had recorded 86 cases since the outbreak of the pandemic in the state, out of which 37 were still active.

“During this time, we have also traced over 500 contacts in relation to the number of cases we have had,” Yaya-Kolade said.

In his own remarks, the Commissioner for the Environment, Gbenga Agbeyo, said the fumigation exercise being undertaken by government had covered five out of the 16 local government areas of the state.

Agbeyo said the exercise would also cover core ministries and government’s institutions, adding that it was necessary before reopening schools.