I Did Not Call Covid-19 A Sham- Nwajiuba
Minister of State for Education, Hon Emeka Nwajiuba has denied media reports which quoted him as describing the COVID 19 Pandemic as “a sham”.
Reacting to one of the reports published in the Pilot newspaper, Hon. Nwajiuba said it would be out of place for him to describe COVID 19 as a sham when he had been appointed a member of the Presidential Task Force charged with the responsibility of fashioning our National response to the containment of the disease.
He said he only submitted a proposal from his ministry on strategies on how to reopen schools without endangering the lives of Nigerian children.
He stated that he never made the comment credited to him in the course of his presentation at the National Assembly on 23rd June. The Minister further said that no responsible member of the PTF would make such a statement bearing in mind the enormous responsibilities the President and the Nation had bestowed on the Group.
Hon. Nwajiuba noted that the COVID 19 Pandemic was real and required conserted actions from all and sundry to tackle. He added that his Ministry had been working assiduously with other agencies of Government at all levels to see how the Pandemic could be contained.
He wondered why anybody would say the disease never existed when over nine million people all over the world had already been infected.
Nwajiuba advised journalists to check their facts before rushing to the Press in order not to embarrass individuals who are making sacrifices for the Nation and the entire humanity. He opined that in Journalism, “facts are sacred and comments are free”.
A Chieftain of the All Progressives Congress(APC) and a former member of the House of Representatives, Hon. Chidi Nwogu described the comment credited to the Minister as “mischievous”. He implored journalists to be conscious of the responsibility they owe the Public in their duties. He added that the report on Nwajiuba was fake and should be disregarded.