Today, 13th of September, 2023 is the court case of the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu. Onyendu as he is popularly called by millions of his followers around the world will be appearing in an Abuja High Court to continue his trial before Justice Binta Nyako.
Recall that Mr. Kanu was accused by the Federal Government of various offences in a 15 count charges, including treasonable felony and terrorism, offences he allegedly committed in the course of his agitation for the sovereign state of Biafra. However, the presiding judge, Binta Nyako, had on April 8, 2022 struck out eight of the 15 charges in her ruling on Mr. Kanu’s preliminary objection challenging the validity of his trial. Mrs Nyako ruled that Counts 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, and 14 were incompetent for not disclosing any valid offences against the defendant:
“In this instant preliminary objection application, I have read the counts and counts 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 and 14 have not disclosed any offence,” Mrs Nyako said.
She, however, ruled that Counts 1, 2, 3, 4, 5,13 and 15 disclosed valid charges against Mr. Kanu. She therefore asked the prosecution to precede to trial on the remaining seven charges, ordering the prosecuting lawyer, Shuaibu Labaran, to file a fresh proof of evidence before the next hearing date. On May 18, 2022, the judge, in a separate ruling, validated the federal government’s repatriation of Mr. Kanu from Kenya to face the charges pending against him in Nigeria.
Five of the seven sustained charges have to do with alleged acts of terrorism, including professing to be a member and leader of IPOB, a proscribed organization, issuing inciting and deadly threats against individuals, and issuing directives, among others. Count 15 has to do with the illegal importation of a radio transmitter he declared as used household items in violation of section 47 (2) (a) of the Criminal Code Act. Cap, C45 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria 2004.
Mr. Kanu had long pleaded not guilty to all 15 charges. The validity of the seven remaining charges, the jurisdiction of the Abuja High Court to entertain them knowing that Kanu was extraordinarily renditioned from Kenya in contravention of international law and the reason the case originally slated for 11th of October was hurriedly shifted to 13th of September are not the concern of this reflection.
For academic purposes however, let me mention that conjectures abound on why the date of the case was shifted. Some members of the Obedient Movement have voiced out concern that the Federal Government may be trying to use Kanu to destabilize Peter Obi’s rising profile in the upcoming election. It is also rumored that the Buhari’s administration might have found the indicting evidence it has long sought for and is now would want to hurry the case to ensure that Kanu’s is locked away before the expiration of his administration next year.
Whatever the reasons for shifting the case, I have no intention of speculating on them. As for the validity of the remaining seven charges, that should be for Justice Nyako and the court to decide. However, many legal experts in their analysis have long argued that Kanu’s case is not legal but a political matter that requires political leaders to sit on round table and find negotiated solutions.
It was the belief on the political nature of the case that made a highly powered group of Igbo leaders met with President Muhammadu Buhari and pleaded with him to release Kanu to them and allow the case to be resolved politically. The renowned Igbo leader and a 90 year old Minister of Aviation during the First Republic, Chief Mbazulike Amaechi personally implored President Buhari to release Kanu to him to enable him find lasting solution to the Biafran agitation. This group has met with the President twice to lodge this request but all their pleas fell on deaf ears as Buhari was adamant that the law should be allowed to take its full course.
Kanu’s Case and the Need for Reconciliation in Nigeria
Buhari wants Kanu to face the charges against him in court and one would ask, what is wrong about that? Personally, I don’t think there is anything wrong with that. However, the issue at stake here is not that Kanu cannot face his trial, irrespective of whether he is guilty or not. Kanu can be convicted or even executed. If this happens, Kanu would not be the first person to die of a crime he committed. But Kanu’s conviction or acquittal is not the real issue here. The real issue and the major question anyone who has interest in the survival and progress of this country should be asking is: will Kanu’s conviction and as the case maybe, onward execution bring peace and unity to Nigeria? Or will it rather make Nigeria more divided and increase the mistrust and acrimony that have always existed among its tribes especially between the Igbo and President Buhari’s tribe, the Fulani?
I honestly feel doing any harm to Kanu, will not serve any national interest; not even the ethnic interests of the Fulani who many accuse President Mohammadu Buhari of representing. If Kanu is jailed or executed today, millions of Ndi Igbo all over the world will never forgive Buhari and that acrimony will inevitably be transferred to his Fulani kinsmen and continue to pollute Nigeria’s political space with hate and hold the country down from making progress.
Many analysts have again and again indentified lack of unity as the fundamental problem making Nigeria backward. Obviously in existence before the civil war but the war and the inability of the successive Nigerian governments to address the sense of injustice in the average Igbo man, is the most important factor contributing to the present disunity. The Igbo nation has not forgiven Nigeria and everyone who supported Nigeria in that civil war that killed millions of our people. The ongoing controversy between Prof. Uju Anya’s post on the late British Monarch is just a tip of the iceberg on how wounded the average Igbo is about that war.
President Buhari’s Golden Opportunity
Kanu might have been that lonely voice of a deranged man crying over a pirated radio all the way from London about the marginalization of Ndi Igbo. But that has changed. Whether anybody likes it or not, Kanu today is the embodiment of all the crimes and sense of injustice of the Igbo nation against Nigerian. If nothing has demonstrated this, the Monday sit-at-home and the willingness of the people to continue with it in spite of the hardship associated with it is enough to tell anybody how sentimentally connected to Kanu’s situation the Igbo man has become. Many people, including my humble-self, feel that Kanu is not just the one held at the DSS dungeon but the Igbo nation; that Kanu is not just the one on trial before the court of Justice Nyako but the great Igbo nation that has contributed to the development of this country more than any other ethnic group.
This is where Buhari’s golden opportunity comes in. Fundamentally, President Buhari has no problem with Ndi Igbo. Apart from the many toes he stepped on as a military head of state and the fact that he ran in 2015 against Jonathan, the adopted son of Ndi Igbo, the underlining problem of Buhari and the Igbo as it stands today is Nnamdi Kanu. Through Kanu, Igbo youths have come to see Buhari as a hater of the Igbo. And Ndi Igbo have come to see Buhari as a man on vendetta because of the way he is handling Kanu’s case. This view against Buhari is obviously transferred to his Fulani brothers and supporters thereby furthering and fanning the amber of hatred across ethnic divides in the country.
I believe that Buhari has the power to end this circle of hatred and acrimony that has held this country down for too long. President Mohammadu Buhari can do a lot of good to this country by granting Ndi Igbo this one thing that is so dear to them: releasing Kanu. Freeing Kanu tomorrow will endear Buhari’ to the hearts and minds of millions of Igbo men and women much more than moving around with the likes of Hope Uzodimma and Dave Umahi, who are regarded as traitors and enemies of the people. Buhari between today and tomorrow has a key to the heart of the Igbo nation and will go down in history not only as the leader that reconciled Nigeria but as the pacifier of Ndi Igbo if by tomorrow he instructs Justice Binta Nyako to let Nnamdi Kanu go. Will Buhari do this? That would depend on which between reconciling Nigerians and proving to Kanu and Ndi Igbo that he is not Jibril from Sudan is Buhari’s priority. Tomorrow is the D-day and we shall soon be finding out.
