Buhari’s De@th: No One Takes Convoy To The Grave – Moses Paul Urges Leaders To Serve With Purpose

Moses Paul, the African Democratic Congress (ADC) chairmanship candidate for AMAC in the FCT, has urged Nigerian leaders to face the inevitability of de@th with humility and allow it to transform the way they lead, live, and serve the nation. Speaking days after the de@th of the immediate past President of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari, Paul revealed that, “Every time a leader d!es, we are reminded of a truth we often ignore. Our time too will come. No position, no wealth, no security detail, no popularity can delay the final call.” He invoked the examples of global figures like Queen Elizabeth II, Pope John Paul II, and Steve Jobs, emphasizing how even the most powerful and celebrated eventually bowed to mortality, not with pomp but with dignity and the memories they left behind. “There is a disturbing arrogance of power in this country,” he said. “You see it in the convoys, in the grandstanding, in the looting of public funds, in the silencing of dissent. Yet all it takes is one breath withheld, and it is over.” Bringing the reflection closer to home, Paul paid tribute to the late Dora Akunyili, Chinua Achebe, and Gani Fawehinmi, whom he described as Nigerians who “d!ed empty, having poured out what they carried.” “The real question is not ‘Will I d!e?’ but ‘How am I living now?’” he said. “Are we using power to uplift, or to exploit? Are we building legacies, or just reputations?” He sharply criticized the state of the nation’s healthcare system and public infrastructure, linking leadership failure to the suffering and untimely de@ths of countless Nigerians. “Most Nigerians face de@th the same way they face life, without electricity, without medicine, without care,” he lamented. “We must build a nation where people do not need to run abroad to live or to d!e.” Citing the examples of Nelson Mandela and Julius Nyerere, both of whom stepped down voluntarily while still revered, Dr. Paul emphasized that dignity in leadership is not in holding on to power but in walking humbly among one’s people. “Let your loved ones feel the warmth of your love more than the cold of the world,” he advised. “That is how we honour life, even in de@th.” “Nobody takes a convoy to the grave. Only memory follows us. Let us live and lead so that when we are gone, those who remain won’t just say ‘He d!ed.’ They will say, ‘He lived for something.’” President Muhammadu Buhari, who d!ed at the age of 82, served as Nigeria’s Head of State from 1983 to 1985 and as a democratically elected President from 2015 to 2023.