Ohanaeze Ndigbo, the Igbo apex socio-political group, has called for the release of Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, Nnamdi Kanu, before Christmas.
The group’s Vice President, Chief Damian Okeke-Ogene made the demand on Sunday as the Supreme Court is set to make a judgment in his case next week.
The question is whether the apex Court, which is set to rule on his matter will put an end to the IPOB’S leader’s more-than-two years detention predicament.
Ohanaeze also called for the arrest of Samuel Ekpa by liaising with the government of Finland where he currently operates, for promoting violence in the country.
Ekpa had made himself the IPOB’s defacto leader following Kanu’s incarceration.
The IPOB leader had been detained in the custody of the Department of State Services, DSS, since July 2021 following his arrest in Kenya by the joint Nigeria/ Kenyan security forces.
The courts had ruled that the federal government had no reason to keep him in detention.
The last being the Court of Appeal which ordered his release on October 12, 2022, saying his continued detention contravened local and international laws.
The Supreme Court will determine the federal government’s appeal on the issue on December 15.
Ohanaeze, however, called on the federal government to release him, saying peace will return to the restive southeast region if Kanu regains his freedom by the middle of this month.
Okeke- Ogene urges the Igbo to jettison rumours that southeast governors and other influential politicians were behind Kanu’s continued detention. Perish the thought, he said.
Ohanaeze said, “We don’t want to dwell much on the politics about the release of Kanu. If he is released on December 15, it is long overdue because competent courts of jurisdiction have on two occasions found him not guilty and also released him, but till now, nothing was done about it.
“So, we hope that the Supreme Court will equally do justice to it with the expectation that every Igbo man is expecting that President Bola Tinubu should know that the money and lives being wasted on the issue are not worth it. And he should, therefore, set the man free as a Christmas gift to the South-East if he truly wants peace to return to the region.
“The President should emulate former Presidents Umaru Yar’Adua and Goodluck Jonathan, who used the carrot and stick approach to stop the issue of militancy in the Niger Delta region. The average Igbo person is also facing the same situation.
“Kanu should be a free man from December 15 and anything short of that has dashed the hope of the whole of the people of South-East this Christmas. If he is not released, it will be a black Christmas in the region.
“We are not in the position to pre-empt the court but for now, we are looking up to the Supreme Court, if it is a country where the judiciary works, we don’t have to be afraid that the Federal Government would influence the judgment.”
“As far as we know, there is a group now using the agitation to cause insecurity in the region. First of Okeke-Ogene, however, berated the Federal Government for its inability to collaborate with the government of Finland to tackle the issue of the autopilot arm of IPOB, led by Simon Ekpa, who is generally acclaimed to be fuelling insecurity in the region in the name of agitation.
“If Kanu is released, we will hear from him and we will all join hands together to discuss these issues. And our people hiding in the bushes would come out and be rehabilitated.
“On Simon Ekpa and his group in Finland, we believe that the Federal Government is enjoying what they are doing, otherwise there is a diplomatic way of resolving the issue. It is a government-to-government collaboration and the Federal Government has not explored that avenue to resolve the situation.”
This is not the first time the umbrella Igbo group had called for Kanu to be released from detention, whereas the federal government had ignored such appeal on the grounds that the rule of law must take full course.
