WHAT AISHA BUHARI IS DOING AT THE UN

Aisha Buhari

A wailer friend of mine has just queried what Mrs. Aisha Buhari is doing on the entourage of President Buhari to the 71st UN General Assembly. He even asked why she should be an “audience” in the UN conference, and also lampooned Mr. President for waste of public fund by taking his wife along.

I don’t want to believe that wailers are beginning to have less and less of what to wail about. Otherwise, what end would wailing about a President taking his wife on an official foreign trip serve? I don’t even know how anyone would think that the UN would accredit anyone who has no business being there, to participate in its activities – especially in these days of insecurity everywhere.  Is this a lapse of logic or collapse of rigour? President Buhari does not control the UN, so he couldn’t have ordered the UN to accredit his wife.

Now, here is the essence of Mrs. Aisha Buhari’s presence in her husband’s entourage. There is what is called cultural diplomacy. That is the role her presence is fulfilling. But she is definitely not part of the UN deliberations, or official Nigerian delegation. Like wife of any other President or Head of State, or even any other world personality for that matter, she can be at the UN as an observer. Even at that, she must be accredited and admitted as such. That does not make her part of UN deliberations; nor does it confer on her the status of official representative of the sovereign State of Nigeria in the UN General Assembly.

The late Yasir Arafat, even without a state, was once at the UN. In fact he did address the UN. Even ordinary chairmen and CEOs of companies sometimes do take their wives on foreign official trips duly paid for by their company. How much more the President of a country.

It is not everything we must wail about. Cultural diplomacy is not limited to Nigeria alone. Heads of State and Presidents of other countries usually attend world conferences with their wives – sometimes even with their children. The family side is to promote cultural diplomacy, to project the essential family life of their home country. That is the role their family plays, albeit an unofficial one, and that is the role Aisha Buhari’s presence is playing.