‘COVID-19 is afraid of our people’ — Kogi lawmakers refuse to commit to taking vaccine

Senators and members of the house of representatives from Kogi have said no decision has been taken yet on the use of COVID-19 vaccine in the state.

President Muhammadu Buhari and Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo had received a shot of the vaccine earlier this month.

Senate President Ahmad Lawan also got his first jab of the vaccine on Tuesday.

But speaking with Punch, Smart Adeyemi, leader of the Kogi lawmakers’ forum in the national assembly, said lawmakers from the state have not reached a decision on whether to take the vaccine.

Adeyemi, who represents Kogi west at the senate, doubles as vice chairman of the Northern Senators Forum.

He said the 12 federal lawmakers from Kogi are behind Yahaya Bello, their governor, on his stance regarding the infection.

The Kogi governor has maintained that COVID-19 is not the business of people in his state, adding that they have “more pertinent” issues to tackle.

The senator said if Kogi lawmakers will take the vaccine, it will be because of their presence in Abuja. He claimed that COVID-19 does not affect Kogi people.

“The Kogi state legislators in the national assembly have not thought of taking the vaccines yet, but if ever we will take it at all, it is because we are in Abuja where there is COVID-19 but there is no COVID in our state,” he said.

“I don’t know the magic in Kogi state because the coronavirus is not killing our people. If it is leading to deaths in the state, I would be the first person to cry out and disagree with our governor but our people are not dying and they are not falling ill.

“I agree with our governor that there is no COVID-19 in Kogi state. If the disease is there, people would have been dying. It appears COVID-19 is afraid of the Kogi people. To a large extent, we are convinced that our governor knows what he is doing and saying.”

The senator said people are neither sick nor dying of the virus in Kogi.

“We cannot be killing our people just to justify that the disease is real. We are not just saying yes to our governor but we are also saying yes to him because nobody has died of the disease,” he said.

“We cannot disagree with our governor. How do we disagree with a man who maintains a position and stands by it and you don’t have any contrary fact to fault him? Our people are not dying and we should not be hypocritical about it.

“Governor Bello is a highly courageous person. He takes a position the moment he knows what he is doing is in the best interest of the people. If our people are dying, we would have spoken against it.

“If the people are dying, we will shout but we are not talking because our people are not falling sick and we are not recording deaths as a result of COVID-19. Only the aged are dying of age-related ailments.”