The family of Tukur Buratai, chief of army staff, clashed
with the Borno COVID-19 team over the initial refusal of the government to
release the body of the late mother of the army’s chief, TheCable reports
Kakah Hajja, Buratai’s mother, who died on Tuesday, was said
to have suffered complications of COVID-19.
Sources at the University of Maiduguri Teaching Hospital
(UMTH) said Hajja was brought into the intensive care unit of the hospital and
tested positive for the disease before she died.
Umar Kadafur, Borno deputy governor and coordinator of the
state’s COVID-19 team, was said to have told the family that there was a
protocol to be followed when a person dies of the disease.
But the Buratai family members reportedly disagreed with the
deputy governor and this led to a heated argument, according to one of the
sources.
“İbrahim Buratai, a brother to the army chief who led others
to the hospital, insisted that their mother had been battling with this illness
for over three months and can’t be said to have died COVID-19.
“The deputy governor also insisted on the regulation that
corpses of COVID-19 patients should not be released to the family.”
The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control (NCDC) has specified
conditions under which bodies of those who died from COVID-19 can be released.
One of the conditions is that the body would have been
treated properly by medical experts before it is released.
But the Buratai family members were said to have demanded
the corpse immediately after the woman died.
The issue was said to have degenerated from an argument into
a fight between the deputy governor’s security aides and soldiers from 7
division of the army who escorted Buratai’s family members to the hospital.
“The deputy governor had and the senior army officer at the
scene had to intervene before the body was released to the family and they
left,” another source said.
“She had since been buried at the Maimalari cantonment,” the
source added.
The deputy governor hails from Biu local government, where
Buratai is also from.
When contacted, Bakura Abba, the state’s commissioner of
information, said he was not aware of the incident.
Musa Sagir, spokesman of the Nigerian Army, neither
responded to calls nor text messages.
The state has been responsible for burial of people
suspected to have died from COVID-19 complications, including Muhammed Goni, a
former governor of the state, who died in April.
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