Americans, Europeans Only See Us as Guinea Pigs – El-Rufai

Malik Yahya/

Kaduna State governor, Malam Nasir el-Rufai, has declared that Americans and Europeans have nothing but cupboard love for Africans who they only want to use as guinea pigs.

He said, “In my view, the lessons are that we are on our own. The rest of the world does not care. The rest of the world is becoming increasingly nationalistic.

“As a state government, we are even trying to get test kits for COVID-19 because America and Europe are buying up everything. Nobody cares about Africa.

“They only think of us when they want to test vaccines or when something dangerous is to be tried. So, we must be more nationalistic and try to develop our internal capacity to produce and be self-sufficient.”

El-Rufai made the remarks during a webinar to commemorate the 63rd birthday of the Minister of Interior and former Osun State governor, Rauf Aregbesola, yesterday.

During the session, he also affirmed that the National Leader of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, was not his friend.

His words, “I want to congratulate my brother, Ogbeni (Aregbesola), on his birthday. You know I’m your man any day. I’m not Asiwaju’s man and you are Asiwaju’s man, but I am your man any day. Asiwaju and I have differences but you and I have no differences.”

El-Rufai added that the COVID-19 pandemic had revealed the state of healthcare facilities in Nigeria, while calling for urgent government intervention in the sector.

“Look at our health care system; we are struggling to deal with this pandemic,” he said. “In our individual state, do we have a public hospital that can look after the governors? When I tested positive, I got treated by the public health system and here I am.”