KEY POINTS
- Aisha Buhari Buhari health crisis began with disrupted nutrition.
- Villa gossip fueled fear and worsened Buhari’s condition.
- Aisha Buhari Buhari health crisis improved after routine returned.
Former First Lady Aisha Buhari has offered a deeply personal account of the health crisis that sidelined her husband, the late President Muhammadu Buhari, for 154 days in 2017, saying rumours inside Aso Rock disrupted his carefully managed nutrition and accelerated his decline.
Her account appears in a new 600-page biography, From Soldier to Statesman: The Legacy of Muhammadu Buhari, written by Charles Omole and launched at the State House on Monday. The book traces Buhari’s life from his childhood in Daura to his final days in a London hospital in July 2025.
According to Aisha Buhari, the illness that sparked months of medical treatment abroad was neither mysterious nor the result of poisoning. Instead, she said it began when a strict feeding and supplement routine she had supervised for years broke down after the couple moved into the presidential villa.
Aisha Buhari explains Buhari health crisis
In the book, Aisha Buhari recounts that she had long overseen her husband’s meals, supplements and feeding schedule, describing him as a “slender man with a long history of malnutrition symptoms.” She said the regimen was essential to maintaining his strength.
That routine, she explained, frayed amid gossip within the presidency. Rumours circulated that she intended to harm him, claims she said her husband believed briefly. During that period, Buhari reportedly began locking his room, altered daily habits and, most critically, stopped eating properly.
“For a year, he did not have lunch. They mismanaged his meals,” she said, according to the book. Supplements were halted, meals delayed or skipped, and his condition deteriorated.
Buhari health crisis and recovery
The decline culminated in two extended medical trips to the United Kingdom in 2017, during which Buhari temporarily transferred power to Vice President Yemi Osinbajo. On his return, Buhari publicly admitted he had “never been so ill” and had required blood transfusions.
In London, doctors prescribed an even stronger nutrition plan. Initially resistant, Buhari eventually improved after Aisha Buhari took charge of administering supplements, mixing them discreetly into his food. She described a rapid turnaround: within days, he abandoned his walking stick and resumed receiving visitors.
The biography also addresses the swirl of conspiracy theories that followed Buhari’s absences, including claims of poisoning and the persistent “Jibril of Sudan” body-double rumour, which Aisha Buhari dismissed as absurd.
Omole argues that Buhari’s reliance on overseas treatment reflected decades of underinvestment in Nigeria’s health system rather than secrecy. He also notes that Buhari’s consistent handover of authority during illness preserved institutional order.
Beyond health, the book depicts a presidency marked by mistrust, with Aisha Buhari alleging surveillance and internal intrigue that deepened fear around the president’s final years.
