IPOB laments Supreme Court delay on Nnamdi Kanu

The outlawed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) has lamented “long delay” by the Supreme Court of Nigeria to hear an appeal filed before it by the Nigerian government against the acquittal granted to its leader, Nnamdi Kanu, by the Court of Appeal.

The group disclosed this in a statement by its spokesperson, Emma Powerful, on Tuesday, according to a report by Vanguard newspaper.

Background

IPOB is a group leading the agitation for an independent state of Biafra, which it wants carved out from the South-east and some parts of the South-south.

Mr Kanu, its leader, was first arrested in 2015, but was granted bail in April 2017. He fled the country after an invasion of his home in Afara-Ukwu, near Umuahia, Abia State, by the Nigerian military in September of that year.

He was re-arrested in Kenya and brought back to Nigeria in June 2021, about four years after he fled the country.

The Court of Appeal, Abuja, on 13 October, held that the IPOB leader was extra-ordinarily renditioned to Nigeria and that the action was a flagrant violation of the country’s extradition treaty and also a breach of his fundamental human rights.

The court, therefore, struck out the terrorism charges filed against Mr Kanu by the Nigerian government and ordered his release from the custody of Nigeria’s secret police, State Security Service, in Abuja.

But the government refused to release the IPOB leader insisting that he (Kanu) could be unavailable in subsequent court proceedings if released and that his release would cause insecurity in the South-east.

The government, through the office of the Attorney-General of the Federation, later appealed the court ruling and subsequently obtained an order staying execution of the court judgement at the Supreme Court.

IPOB kicks

Emma Powerful, in the statement on Tuesday, said the silence and delay of the court to hear the appeal was worrisome given all the accelerated hearing processes filed on the case.

The IPOB spokesperson said the secessionist group suspects that the recent political developments and alleged ethnic profiling of Ndigbo in Nigeria were also playing out in the case of the IPOB leader.

He claimed that the Supreme Court had accelerated hearing in political cases, but chose to treat Mr Kanu’s case differently.

“The continuous silence and refusal of the Justices of the Supreme Court of Nigeria to set a date of hearing on the appeals brought before them by the federal government against the discharge and acquittal order from the Abuja Appeal Court has shown that the apex court is not neutral in this case.

“The Supreme Court has shown that Biafrans are not safe in Nigeria. These actions justify Biafrans’ quest for a referendum to decide our economic and political future as an independent nation. Gone are the days when it is said that the judiciary is the hope of the common man, not anymore in Nigeria,” Mr Powerful said.

He said the group and its leader, Mr Kanu, had vowed never to stop the demand for referendum and eventual independence of Biafra from Nigeria.

“Nigeria’s executive arm of government has subjugated both the judiciary and the legislative arms of the same government.

“The apex cum constitutional court must understand that the abuse of Appeal Court orders because it is ruled in favour of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, will ridicule them before the whole world and eventually embolden the executive branch to become a law unto itself going forward,” he added.