Buhari embarks on 8-day state visit to Saudi Arabia

PRESIDENT Muhammadu Buhari is embarking on an eight-day state visit to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia starting on Tuesday, April 11.

The primary purpose of the visit, according to a statement released on Monday, April 10, by his Senior Special Assistant on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, is to perform Umrah, the Lesser Hajj Pilgrimage.

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This is likely to be Buhari’s last trip to the Kingdom as Nigeria’s President.

Buhari has been known to travel frequently since he became President in 2015, making both official and private trips to various parts of the world.

Some of his foreign trips, which have cost the country billions of taxpayers money, include visits to countries such as the United States, China, the United Kingdom, France, Germany, and South Africa, among others.

Between the last quarter of 2021 and the second quarter of 2022, Buhari visited Addis Ababa, Belgium, Gambia, Ghana, Cote D’Ivoire, Equatorial Guinea, France, Kenya, Portugal, Rwanda, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Spain, Turkey, The United Arab Emirates (UAE) The United Kingdom (UK), among several others.

In June 2022, the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) accused Buhari of squandering taxpayers’ resources on meaningless, insatiable international trips.

“The meaningless foreign trips of President Muhammadu Buhari which have no economic benefits are disturbing. These trips must stop as they are not exigent and are aimed at squandering taxpayers’ resources and for the President to find a phantom alibi for his monumental incompetence and rudderless political leadership style.

“Buhari and his deputy have spent over N10 billion on foreign trips in the last seven years while the Academic Staff Union of Universities has perpetually been on strike, demanding their rightful entitlements.

“It is more reprehensible that the President can be junketing many countries of the world while Nigeria faces educational, economic, energy, and severe security crises of all times,” HURIWA’s National Coordinator Emmanuel Onwubiko said.

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