The supreme court has fixed December 15 to deliver judgment on appeals regarding the continued detention of Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the proscribed Indigenous People Of Biafra (IPOB).
A five-member panel of the apex court led by Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, fixed the date for judgment after counsels for the federal government and Kanu adopted their final arguments.
The IPOB leader has been in the custody of the Department of State Services (DSS) since he was extradited from Kenya on June 19, 2021.
Subsequently, the federal government filed terrorism charges against him.
On April 8, 2022, Binta Nyako, a federal high court judge in Abuja, struck out eight of the 15 counts in the charge.
The remaining seven counts were later quashed by the court of appeal on October 13, 2022, with the judge ordering Kanu’s release.
However, on October 28, 2022, the court of appeal granted a stay of execution on its verdict discharging Kanu, after the federal government filed an appeal at the supreme court.
Kanu subsequently appealed the order staying execution.
During proceedings on Thursday, Mike Ozekhome, Kanu’s lawyer, prayed the court to order the immediate release of his client from detention and award “very heavy and punitive cost” against the federal government.
“We urge my lords to uphold our cross-appeal in order to do substantial justice to this matter and to the respondent who has been in detention since June 29, 2021, even after the lower court ordered his release and that he should never be prosecuted again on the same counts,” Ozekhome said.
“They are still holding him unconstitutionally. We pray my lords to deliver justice and use this case, just like in Ojukwu vs. State, to demonstrate that no man or government should be above the law.”
However, in his submission, Tijjani Gazzali, the federal government’s counsel, prayed the court to set aside the judgment of the court of appeal which ordered Kanu’s release, and order the resumption of his trial before the federal high court in Abuja on terrorism-related charges.
