Nigerian chief dethroned for divorcing wife over polio
vaccine
11/09/2008
A traditional chief in northern Nigeria's
Borno state was suspended from
office Thursday after divorcing his wife for having their children immunised
against polio, a state spokesman said.
Bulama Ali, a respected local traditional leader, was removed from office by
his superiors in the Maisandari district shortly after he ditched his wife
in protest at her allowing health workers to administer oral polio drops to
his two small children.
"The traditional chief was suspended... for divorcing his wife for allowing
health workers to immunise his two children against polio," Borno state
spokesman Usman Ciroma told AFP.
Ali "still believes that polio vaccine can render children infertile," said
Ciroma.
He said Borno is one of the worst polio-affected states in northern Nigeria
due to public rejection of polio vaccines.
"The district head has ordered Bulama Ali to take his wife back or lose his
seat," Ciroma said.
Health workers on Wednesday launched a four-day house-to-house polio
immunisation operation aimed at children under five across Borno state.
Radical muslim clerics and some medical doctors in the north have since 2003
spearheaded a campaign against the polio vaccine, arguing that it is laced
with substances that could render girls infertile as part of a US-led
western plot to depopulate Africa.
This led to the suspension of polio immunisation by most northern states for
more than a year until clinical trials in and outside Nigeria proved the
vaccine safe.
As a result of the suspension of vaccinations, hundreds of new polio cases
have been reported in the northern states in recent months.
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