Abdullahi Ganduje, governor of Kano state, has appealed for an urgent ease of the 14-day total lockdown the federal government imposed on the state.

Following the rise in COVID-19 cases and the strange deaths in the state, President Muhammadu Buhari had ordered a total lockdown in Kano which took effect on Monday.

But the governor said it is important to relax the lockdown for a while in order to ease the hardship in the state, especially in the holy month of Ramadan.

Speaking on Thursday at the government house where he inaugurated a panel of experts to support the state task force technical committee, Ganduje said government is expanding treatment centres for COVID-19.

“We would engage the presidential task force on COVID-19 to seek permission to relax the total lockdown imposed on Kano,” he said.

“We are making this appeal on behalf of our people who are presently running out of food items. We would love the federal government to relax the lockdown for a period of time to enable people stock their homes, especially now that majority of us are fasting. It will also ease the economic hardship in the state.”

The panel led by Musa Borodo, president of the National Postgraduate Medical College of Nigeria, was given the responsibility of developing strategy and supporting the state task force on COVID-19 to adopt measures for checking the spread of the virus.

Tijani Hussain, the state coordinator of the task force, put the COVID-19 death toll in Kano at five, saying none of the deceased died at the isolation centre.  (The Cable)