Nnamdi Kanu’s provisional freedom

Nnamdi Kanu, the self-styled President of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) who has been leading efforts to achieve the Republic of Biafra for the Igbo people, spent less than two years in Kuje prison before he threw in the towel and accepted what a national newspaper called ‘iron bail.’ Kanu was arrested on 14th […]

Nnamdi Kanu, the self-styled President of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) who has been leading efforts to achieve the Republic of Biafra for the Igbo people, spent less than two years in Kuje prison before he threw in the towel and accepted what a national newspaper called ‘iron bail.’ Kanu was arrested on 14th October, 2015 at a hotel in Lagos and has been facing trial for alleged treasonable felony alongside three other persons at a High Court in Abuja. Did Kanu think freedom fighting is a matter of few days of imprisonment and futile propaganda coordinated from outside prison by one’s kinsmen? Didn’t he learn from Nelson Mandela, the Madiba (sounds like the redeemer), who spent 27 years in prison in South Africa and rejected every attempt to release him except it led to freedom for the country’s majority? 

There were about a dozen almost impossible conditions that Kanu had had to fulfil before he was released. They were handed over by an Abuja High Court presided over by Justice Binta Murtala Nyako described by IPOB as President Muhammadu Buhari’s ‘sister.’ According to Justice Nyako, the bail was granted based on Nnamdi Kanu’s complaint of ill-health. The Judge said that upon release, Kanu must not hold rallies; he must not grant media interviews; he must not be in a crowd exceeding ten persons; he must provide three sureties in the sum of N100 million each, one of whom must be a senior and highly paced person of Igbo extraction, such as a Senator. It became the lot of Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe to fulfil this need for Kanu. The bail conditions also required a highly respected Judaism religious leader since Kanu had declared himself a follower of Judaism. On hand to fulfil this condition was a Port Harcourt based Jewish Rabbi, Immanuel Shalom Okabemadu. The third surety must also be a highly respected person who owns landed property and is resident in in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT). This particular demand was met by an Abuja-based businessman called Tochukwu Uchendu. Justice Binta also demanded Kanu to deposit his Nigerian passport as well as his British passport; he must provide the court a progress report on his health and treatment on a monthly basis. The surrender of his two passports meant he would not be able to travel outside the country.

At first, it was reported that Kanu had rejected his bail on the grounds that his three comrades – Chidibere Onwudiwe, Benjamin Madubugwu and David Nwawuisi – had been excluded from enjoying the facility. His father had also rejected the bail conditions which he said were impossible to fulfil. The choice was up to Kanu to accept the bail and enjoy some measure of freedom or reject it and remain imprisoned for only God knows when. So messy is the situation that the new Biafran leader has had to start from the prison!

Kanu’s bail is clearly the outcome of a long, secret and tortuous negotiation and the ultimate objective is to get him to drop his campaign for a Biafran state in exchange for his freedom. Lately, many prominent Igbos, a people always eager to protect one of their own, have raised their voices against the government and demanded for Kanu’s release from imprisonment. Senators and governors from the South East have all joined the campaign to achieve freedom for him.

Earlier in March, Professor Soludo along with Pat Utomi, Ferdinand Agu, Chidi Odinkalu, Udenta Udenta, Tony Nnadi, Collins Ugwu, Andy Wabali, Innocent Chukwuma, Sam Amadi and a host of others had under the auspices of Nzuko Umunna, which they claimed had sent them “to pay a visit to Kanu and his associates currently in detention at the Kuje prison as part of a worldwide consultation on the peace and development of Alaigbo/Nigeria”, had trenchantly called for the release of Kanu. 

Kanu chose the wrong President to spar with in his separatist agenda. The two men’s aversion for each other may be mutual but certainly, President Buhari is much more pugnacious than Kanu. President Buhari didn’t see any reason why another person, no matter his inspiration, should push Nigeria into another civil war considering the bloodshed and the massive suffering that followed the Biafran war of 1967 to 1970. The President was probably more chagrined by the fact that Nnamdi Kanu is a British citizen, how can a ‘foreigner’ come to Nigeria and instigate another war? This is aside from the personal insult that Kanu had repeatedly heaped on the old man.

Kanu must now be schooled in a more polite culture of struggle by the likes of Professor Ben Nwabueze, Chief Chukwuemeka Ezeife, Professor Elochukwu Amucheaz, Professor ABC Nwosu, etc. He will be told that Biafra only lives in the mind as Odumegwu Ojukwu had said but occupies no territory on the ground. If he truly feels marginalised, he should form or join a political party and fight for power but not establish radio and threaten and slander other people. The South East will continue its struggle for de-marginalisation in a more peaceful way than Kanu envisaged. The young man has already outshone the old and well known Igbo elders fighting for a bigger political space for the South East; neither those elders nor Nigeria will allow him to carry on in the same manner.  

Justice Nyako has set aside the 11th and 12th July, 2017 for definite commencement of the trial of Nnamdi Kanu and his buddies for treasonable felony. If Kanu adheres to the ‘iron bail’, he will remain free but if he breaches any of its conditions, the tough lady Judge will order his return to prison. For now, at least Kanu has been released and we shall see what the misguided guy makes of his conditional freedom.