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    Yar'Adua recovers, may return to office soon

Ailing President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua sprang a surprise on the nation last night when he came down from his room upstairs at the presidential villa in Aso Rock. Daily Sun exclusively gathered that the President, for the first time since he was brought back into the country, visited his study room at about 7.30pm last night and was expected to stay there until about 10pm. He was still there as the time of filing this report.

'For the first time, the President saw and recognised his mother when he came down. He was excited and embraced the woman', said our source.
Details were rather scanty but Daily Sun learnt that members of his immediate family have been overjoyed since the sudden development and are said to have been on the telephone calling up as many people as they could to report the pleasant news.

It was not, however, clear whether the President, who was evacuated from the country on November 23, last year for treatment in Saudi Arabia, was now healthy enough to return to the seat of power at the presidency.
There had been speculations in the past fortnight that the President was recuperating, prompting his family to give access to selected clerics to see him.

The Muslim clerics, who saw him on Good Friday, preceded a select group of Christian clerics, who had visited on Easter Monday. We gathered that the selective audience being granted were aimed at staving off impeachment moves and give him a continued stake on power until he recovers completely.

Hints about President Yar'Adua's imminent return was given earlier yesterday by his cousin, Architect Ahmed Yar'Adua, who is the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of National Inland Waterways, while speaking to Correspondents. He emphatically said his cousin was recuperating fast and would soon return to office.
However, it was not clear immediately whether he would resume official duties promptly.

Presidency officials contacted declined comments on the development, refusing to disclose whether they had been told about any imminent return to office. Yesterday's development, Daily Sun learnt, was a sharp contrast to the reports of some of the clergy, who gave the impression that Yar'Adua's recovery would take an outlandish miracle to come to fruition. They reported that Yar'Adua stared blankly as they prayed for him and were not too sure if he recognised their presence or even responded to their prayers.

Architect Yar'Adua expressed the imminent return of his cousin yesterday while fielding questions from members of the Correspondents chapel, who visited him in his office. He also expressed satisfaction with the level of work on the ongoing dredging of the River Niger and said, at least, 60 percent of the job had been completed while the first lap of the dredging was expected to end by the second quarter of this year.

He disclosed that his organisation, in collaboration with some private investors, was gearing efforts towards the provision of ferry services along Onitsha - Warri waterways to enhance transportation of goods from the riverine areas.

Answering a question on the ferry services between Shintaku-Ganaja waterway, the NIWA boss said his organisation was already fine-tuning ways to restore the ferry services to aid transportation of the communities in the affected area.

He expressed hope that commercial activities within Lokoja and its environs would soon increase when the dredging is finally completed and urged communities along the coastal areas to continue to co-operate with the contractors.