The President of the United States of America, Donald Trump, has been quoted as having said he does not want to meet someone as “lifeless” as Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari again.
A report by the Financial Times quoted Trump as having said so after his meeting with Buhari in April this year.
The unearthing of the comment is coming on the heels of the proposed visit of the President of Kenya, Uhuru Kenyatta, to the United States of America and a meeting with Trump.
The Financial Times, in the publication, titled: “Africa looks for something new out of Donald Trump,” stated: “The first meeting, with Nigeria’s ailing 75-year-old Muhammadu Buhari in April ended with the US President telling aides he never wanted to meet someone so lifeless again, according to three people familiar with the matter.”
Reacting to the development, the Peoples Democratic Party said President Buhari and his handlers have opened “our nation for international ridicule arising from reports quoting United States President, Donald Trump, describing President Buhari as “lifeless”.
The party said such embarrassment is a backlash a nation gets when incompetent leaders, out of inferiority complex, resort to jumping around the world, desperately shopping for endorsement from world leaders.
The party said President Buhari has been seeking international recognitions that are not predicated on any achievements from his three years in office.
It said: “PDP hereby charges Mr. President to take a cue from the comments ascribed to President Trump by settling down at home and discharge his responsibilities to Nigerians or humbly accept his failings.
“While the PDP has strong reservations on the reported comment by President Trump, for which we demand a response from the Buhari Presidency and the US White House, the party further holds that had our dear President not cheapened the exalted office of the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria by his woeful outing during his visit to the United States, President Trump would not have had the opportunity to assess his level of incompetence and make such an embarrassing statement about our President.
“The PDP and indeed all well-meaning Nigerians are now sore worry over how other world leaders have been perceiving our President, who has not only failed in governance but has continued to demarket our nation in the international community.
“The PDP however urges Nigerians not to be downcast by the embarrassing situation the nation has found itself, especially as the 2019 general election, which comes in the next six months, offers the nation the ample opportunity to get it right on the choice of competent leadership Nigerians can be proud of.”
Defending President Buhari and flaying President Trump, the Buhari Media Organisation in a statement by its Chairman, Niyi Akinsiju, and Secretary, Cassidy Maduekwe, noted that that was not the first time the US President was making derogatory remarks about other world leaders.
It stated: “It is important that we put it on record that President Buhari remains fit and sprightly, even for the next decade.
“We recall that during President Buhari’s visit to Trump in the White House, the US President commended the successes that the Buhari administration had recorded especially in the fight against insurgency and the war on corruption.
“The US President was full of admiration for Nigeria’s President during the visit, thus such outlandish remarks as reported by the Financial Times are not just to be taken with a pinch of salt but are untrue in themselves.”
The BMO added that Buhari would not be distracted by the report.