Ebola: Obasanjo castigates Liberian officials for Sawyer’s visit

Former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo has castigated Liberian officials who connived with the late Liberian-American, Patrick Sawyer, to travel to Nigeria, thus importing the deadly Ebola Virus Disease into the country. Obasanjo said this while answering questions from guests at an event tagged, ‘An Afternoon With Obasanjo’ organised by the publisher of Inside Watch Africa magazine, Mr. Oluwaseyi Adegoke-Adeyemo, at the Olusegun Obasanjo Presidential Library, Abeokuta.
He said this singular misadventure had started taking its toll on the manpower and economy of not only Nigeria, but
the West African sub-region.
He said: “It is devilish enough that Patrick Sawyer had to spread this, and, indeed, spread it to Nigeria in connivance with some authorities from his country. Because they knew he had it before he came to Nigeria. The EVD has started to take its toll on the country and the West African sub-region. The toll is not only on the number of those that are ill or dead but on the economy of communities, countries, region and the sub-region.”
Obasanjo said he had a meeting with the Ghanaian President, Mr. John Mahama, who is also the chairman of the Economic Community of West African States, some weeks ago. He said they discussed how to contain the spread of the deadly virus within the sub-region.
But he explained that while Mahama wanted a meeting of ministers of health, he suggested that there was a limit the ministers could go, but rather advised that a summit of the presidents in the sub-region would be better.
The former president who noted that EVD was not only a regional or sub-regional threat but a global one, called for a summit where a regional policy on the disease would be formulated.
Obasanjo also advocated the need to encourage the world’s pharmaceutical companies to carry out research on the virus and come up with the needed vaccine to eliminate it. His words: “Pharmaceutical companies in the country should be encouraged to carry out research on the EVD and come up with vaccines to treat the deadly disease. Also, we have to be aggressive in taking precautionary measures.  When you see your neighbour or someone who has unique symptoms not just of ordinary cold or fever, take him to the doctor, whether it is symptomatic of Ebola or ordinary malaria. We should not wait till someone has incubated it for so long just like Patrick Sawyer, who knew he had it and deliberately spread it.”
He said he had spoken with the presidents of Liberia and Sierra-Leone to “give them words of encouragement and support” on the scourge of Ebola in their countries