President Muhammadu Buhari has warned Muslims against rituals that can spread the COVID-19 in Nigeria as they begin this year’s Ramadan today.

Buhari, in a statement yesterday by his spokesman, Garba Shehu, enjoined them to refrain from group meals and congregational prayers that have been put on hold by Muslim religious authorities all over the world
. He described this year’s Ramadan as a challenge, “particularly as it falls in the period of the global pandemic, which has spread to more than 200 nations, with virtually all countries advising citizens to avoid large gatherings and have their prayers and meals (suhoor and iftar) individually or with family at home.
” He also urged Muslims to endure and not to use coronavirus as an excuse not to participate in the Ramadan fast unless such abstention is warranted by the excuses clearly outlined by health and religious authorities. “In this Ramadan period, the kind of socializing you’re used to now risks spreading coronavirus,” he cautioned.