Photos: Abba Kyari, Chief of Staff to President Buhari laid to rest in Abuja

The body left the defence guest house for burial at Gudu Cemetery after short prayers.

See pictures of funeral

The trusted Chief of Staff to Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari Abba Kyari has died from complications related to Covid-19 after weeks of battle with the virus.

Kyari had widely been seen as one of the three most powerful people in Africa’s largest economy and said to have the complete trust of Buhari. Some had even described him as the defacto head of the government because in a country where the presidency holds an inordinate amount of centralized power and government funds, deciding who has access to the president accords immense power and influence.

And even with a political culture overweighted in outsized egos, Nigeria’s government ministers and state governors had to learn to work by going through Kyari before getting to the ultimate “oga”.

Mr Kyari had tested positive for COVID-19 first broke on March 24, about 10 days after he returned from a trip to Germany during which he met with officials of Siemens in Munich on Nigeria’s electricity expansion programme.

Mr Kyari confirmed the news in a statement on March 29, the same day President Buhari made his first nationwide broadcast on the pandemic and announced a two-week lockdown in Lagos, Ogun and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.

In his statement, Mr Kyari revealed that he would be transferred to Lagos from the FCT for treatment and expressed the hope that he would recover and return to work soon a optimism that COVID-19 did not allow him to fufil.

In a statement signed in Abuja on Sarturday Morning by Mr. Femi Adesina, the Special Adviser to the President
(Media and Publicity) read: “The Presidency regrets to announce the passage of the Chief of Staff to the President, Mallam Abba Kyari.

“The deceased had tested positive to the ravaging COVID-19, and had been receiving treatment. But he died on Friday, April 17, 2020.

“May God accept his soul. Funeral arrangements will be announced shortly.”

Meanwhile, Nigeria still has a relatively low number of confirmed coronavirus cases with just 493 and 17 deaths, relative to its 200 million population. But there have been significant concerns the country is not giving enough tests to be certain with just around 7,000 tests