BUA tackles CACOVID over vaccine donation disclaimer

BUA Group has said its decision to pay for one million doses of AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine for Nigerians, through the AfreximBank vaccine programme in partnership with Coalition Against COVID-19 (CACOVID) is in the interest of the people.

BUA, which alleged that a prominent member of CACOVID was not happy with its donation, said this was no time to play politics with the lives of the people.

In a statement on Monday, the BUA group announced that it had secured one million doses of the AstraZeneca COVID-19 vaccine.

The company added that the vaccine doses would be distributed to Nigerians at no cost.

But in a statement by CACOVID operations committee, the coalition said BUA could not singlehandedly secure the doses, and that purchase of the vaccine could not be done by individuals or companies, but only through the Federal Government.

Reacting to the development, BUA, in another statement, asked CACOVID to stop playing politics with Nigerian lives.

The group said the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele, had announced at a meeting that CACOVID had been given the opportunity through the Afrexim platform to access and pay for one million doses of vaccine, provided payment was made on Monday or Tuesday.

BUA said while other CACOVID members refused to offer the donation to secure the vaccine, it offered to do so by making a payment of $3,450,000,000, which is N1.311 billion, to the CBN.

“BUA receives with utter shock, reports allegedly attributed to CACOVID, disowning its earlier payment through CACOVID for one million AstraZena doses for Nigeria via the AFREXIM vaccine platform,” it said.

It also stated, “BUA did this gesture in good faith as it has done with its interventions throughout the pandemic. We will however like to state clearly that we are aware that a prominent member of CACOVID is not happy that BUA took the initiative to pay for the vaccines – fulfilling our pledge just as we said during the meeting. Now they want to scuttle it by this action because they were unable to take the initiative,” it said.

“We find this release by CACOVID to be very petty and unbecoming of seemingly serious corporate citizens because it is tantamount to playing politics with the lives of Nigerians. This is no time for politics. It is time for us to come together to help Nigerians and it does not matter who is helping or paying.

“We stand ready to keep supporting and despite this petty action we have decided to let the money remain in the CACOVID account with the CBN pending when they are ready to utilize the funds for Nigerians to access the vaccines.”