NaijaBet, a popular sport betting web portal in Nigeria has embarrassed the country’s sick president, Muhammadu Buhari, who has been in London for over 80 days receiving medical treatment for an undisclosed ailment.
The sports betting firm opened a bet on the arrival of Buhari, making gamblers to stake on the date of his arrival, which seems stupid to some people.
We would just like to put this on record, Nigerians want their president back, we are only trying to voice the yearning of the people via the little platform we have,” NaijaBet tweeted yesterday in reply to a tweet by The Guardian on the subject.
The president’s return to Nigeria has been subjected to a lot of speculations though his office has consistently maintained that he would return only when his doctors give him the go ahead.
But speculations surrounding his imminent return were heightened earlier in the week when the presidential jet that has been on standby in the United Kingdom since May 7 reportedly left London.
NaijaBet, in the light of the sprouting assumptions, decided to give punters a chance to bet on President Buhari’s likely return date. The move has been interpreted by some Nigerians as a slap on the ailing leader, but the betting company said it did not mean to disrespect the 74-year old president.
However, we want to show the president and the government that the people are anxious for his well-being and anticipate his early return (hence the short window dates as betting options).
This is coming days after the United States television medium, Cable News Network (CNN) mocked Nigeria over Buhari’s continued absence in the country in its last edition of “The Global Public Square (GPS)”, a foreign affairs show anchored on CNN by Fareed Zakaria.
Recently CNN, made a mockery of Nigeria on its program displaying:
The head of state from which country has not set foot in his homeland in over two months? It went ahead to tick an option with the name Nigeria as the correct answer. Some of the options given were Saudi Arabia, Cuba, Nigeria, and Syria.
