Buhari’s First Day In Office At Aso Rock
President Muhammadu Buhari yesterday resumed work for the first in his office at Aso Villa, Abuja, since his swearing-in as president on May 29.
The president who arrived in his office at about 10:20am had barely settled down to his official duties when his deputy, Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, joined him.
Osinbajo walked from his office to the president’s wing of the Villa where he and his boss held a meeting with some of their principal aides.
The meeting was still in progress when the service chiefs arrived. At the time of filing this report, Buhari was still in a meeting with them and other security chiefs in the country.
The president and his deputy, Osinbajo, had been operating from outside the seat of power, using the Defence House to perform their official function, while Buhari lived in his personal residence at Aso Drive, Abuja.
Their continued stay at Defence House, a place officially meant for a president-elect, even after they were inaugurated, created a lot of anxiety among staff of the State House who were left with no choice but to shuttle between the Villa and the president’s temporary office located in Maitama District.
The development had raised speculation as to why the president and his deputy had refused to move to the Villa, with some persons suggesting that the place was undergoing “a spiritual cleansing”.
But the senior special assistant to the president on media and publicity, Malam Garba Shehu, had refuted such claims and said what had kept Buhari and Osinbajo away was the renovation work going on in the place.
“As far as the president is concerned, the place (his official residence) is not ready yet. Workers are cleaning and refurbishing the place. Once the exercise is completed, the president will move in”, Garba had stated.
