Nigeria's Buhari warns the economy is "too fragile" for another lockdown
CGTN
FILE PHOTO: Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari (R) speaks at a past function. /VCG Photo

FILE PHOTO: Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari (R) speaks at a past function. /VCG Photo

Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari on Thursday said the country's economy is "too fragile" to go through another period of lockdown.

The 77-year-old, through his twitter handle, urged Nigerians to continue adhering to the laid down COVID-19 protocols in order to avoid a resurgence of infections that would prompt the government to impose new lockdown measures.

"Looking at the trends in the other countries, we must do all we can to avert a second wave of COVID-19 in Nigeria. We must make sure that our cases, which have gone down, do not rise again. Our economy is too fragile to bear another round of lockdown," Buhari wrote.

Bihari's warning comes a day after the World Health Organization published COVID-19 trends in Africa and globally.

After seeing a decline in daily new infections, some countries have recently experienced a resurgence of cases, prompting new restrictions.

The WHO report noted that Nigeria had registered 623 new COVID-19 cases and 6 deaths in the last seven days.

By Thursday afternoon, Nigeria had reported 62,371 infections and 1,139 fatalities.

The West African country's caseload is the fifth-highest in Africa, only shadowed by tallies recorded by South Africa, Morocco, Egypt and Ethiopia.