Yar'Adua's Health Improves

Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua, who is undergoing treatment for a heart condition in a Saudi hospital, is 'improving steadily', his ruling party said in a statement last Monday.

'Reports reaching us have it that the president is improving steadily and will soon return to continue the good work he is doing,' People's Democratic Party (PDP) spokesman Rufa'i Ahmed Alkali said.

The statement accused unnamed opposition parties of generating 'hype and tension' over the president's health.

Vice-President Goodluck Jonathan last Friday urged Nigerians to disregard rumours about Yar'Adua, 58, who travelled to Jeddah on Monday, including some that said he was in a coma or had died.

Yar'Adua is hospitalised at King Faisal Hospital in Jeddah for acute pericarditis — inflammation of the membrane covering the heart, officials said of his condition which had been cloaked in secrecy.

He is widely believed to have a history of kidney-related disease for which he has previously received treatment in both Germany and Saudi Arabia.

Yar'Adua was dogged by ill-health even during the election campaign that brought him to power in 2007.