Kogi State Governor, Yahaya Bello has on Friday said he would not take COVID-19 vaccine as he is hale and hearty.
Bello, in an interview on Channels TV’s ‘Today Politics’ on Friday stated that President Muhammadu Buhari could take the vaccine, but that he would not.
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He expressed;
Mr President is the leader of this country. I respect him so high; all of us respect him so much. We love him and he is leading by example. If he needs to take the vaccines and he takes it, it is a welcome development.
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He added;
As far as I am concerned, I as a person, I don’t need to take vaccines. There is nothing wrong with me, I am hale and hearty. I am 100 per cent healthy. I won’t take any vaccine.
Bello stated that COVID-19 is not the business of people in Kogi State, saying that the state had more pertinent issues and more pertinent matters that it was attending to in Kogi State.
The governor, who has repeatedly denied the existence of the virus in his state, said COVID-19 is the “minute aspect” of what the state is currently addressing, adding that Kogi is tackling diseases like Yellow Fever and Lassa Fever, without much noise about its efforts.
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He stressed;
COVID-19 is not our business in Kogi state. We have more prominent issues, more pertinent issues, more serious matters that we are attending to in Kogi state.
Insecurity that we met, we’ve tackled it and several others. Disunity, we met it on ground and we have united Kogi state, not COVID-19.
COVID-19 is just a minute aspect of what we’re treating in Kogi state or handling in Kogi state. There have been outbreaks of Lassa Fever, Yellow Fever — those we handled without making noise about it.
He noted that if the federal government makes vaccine available to the state, he will ensure that those who want it get vaccinated.
Yahaya stressed;
If the federal government is gracious enough and gives us COVID-19 vaccine, we will equally sensitise our people, who wish to take it to come forward and take the vaccine.
But I’m not going to subject the people of Kogi state to vaccination, or I will not make them guinea pigs.
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When asked if he is going to take the vaccine publicly like his counterparts, he said;
I don’t need the vaccine; nothing is wrong with me. I’m hale and hearty — 100 percent hearty.
Yahaya Bello has previously discouraged the use of COVID-19 vaccine, alleging that the jabs are meant to kill people.
He doubted the authenticity of the vaccine, saying why is there is no cure for HIV and many other diseases troubling mankind.
This is not the first time the Kogi governor would cast doubt on the existence of the viral disease in his state or the potency of the vaccine.
Bello has repeatedly violated social distancing rules, among other protocol to curb the spread of the virus.
In his New Year broadcast, Bello said it would be irresponsible of his government to see COVID-19 as a definer of 2020.
He said Kogi will not respond to the second wave of the virus with “mass hysteria”.
The governor had also asked the federal government to focus more on reviving the economy than on how to procure COVID-19 vaccines.
According to Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC), out of the over 158,000 COVID-19 cases in Nigeria, Kogi has only 5 confirmed infections, of which 3 have been discharged.
The health agency stated that the low cases in the state are as a result of low testing rate. Kogi is one the states where COVID-19 tests are low as the governor insists that there is no coronavirus in the state.
