Moves to Fly Gov Sullivan Chime to Nigeria Fails; His Health Getting Worse

Nigerians are in for another drama with regards to a political leader's ill-health:

Attempts to fly ailing Governor Sullivan Chime of Enugu State back to the country from India to celebrate Christmas and New Year with his family proved abortive following the deterioration of his health during the trip, a competent source told Leadership. 

According to the source, the governor who is suspected to be suffering from terminal disease had a relapse when he arrived in London from India, forcing his aides and relatives who accompanied him on the trip to take him back to his hospital bed in India.

The entire Government House, Enugu, and Chime’s personal residence in Udi, his country home, were lavishly decorated with Christmas trees and lightings a week before Christmas as part of preparations to receive the governor, who ostensibly left the country in September 2012.

The source said that the decision to bring him back to the country to celebrate Christmas and New Year was based on the need to douse the tension in the state generated by his long absence from duty.

Governor Chime had, prior to his departure from the country, addressed a letter to the speaker, Enugu State House of Assembly, Barrister Eugene Odo, indicating that he was travelling abroad to spend his accumulated leave, but, according to sources, the letter did not specify the duration of the leave, neither was it brought to the notice of several members of the legislature.

The deputy governor, Mr. Sunday Onyebuchi, has since then been standing in as acting governor, but sources close to Government House, Enugu, alleged that Onyebuchi has limited functions since he cannot award contracts or approve expenditure worth more than a million naira.

Consequently, it is believed that the Enugu State House of Assembly would on resumption from Christmas and New Year recess deliberate on the whereabouts of the governor and, according to a member of the house, “take appropriate action”.