By Adadainfo
A Federal High Court sitting in Umuahia, Abia State, Wednesday, ruled in favour of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu over an extraordinary suit filed on Kanu’s behalf by his special counsel, Barr Aloy Ejimakor.
In the judgement, the court awarded N500 million in damages to Kanu over the illegal manner he was brought to Nigeria from Kenya, and his later detention and trial.
Kanu is the leader of the Indigenous People Of Biafra (IPOB). Aside the damages, the court also requested that Nnamdi Kanu be restituted, implying returning him to the point of his arrest in Kenya with his rights and privileges.
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Our correspodent reports that the judgement was to be delivered tomorrow, but the court shifted it backward by one day.
Recall that Ejimakor had go the to the court to declare that Kanu’s arrest in Kenya ‘is arbitrary’, and that the federal government’s ‘enforced disappearance of the applicant for eight days and their refusal to produce the applicant before a Kenyan court for the purpose of applicant’s extradition amount to infringement of the applicant’s fundamental right as enshrined and guaranteed under the pertinent provisions of CFRN and the Charter’.
Other prayers in the suit were: “The declaration that the detention of the applicant in a non-official secret facility in Kenya and the torture of the applicant in Kenya by the respondents’ agents is illegal, and amount to infringement of the applicant’s fundamental right against unlawful detention, torture and to fair hearing, as enshrined and guaranteed under the pertinent provisions of CFRN and the Charter).
“A declaration that pursuant to Article 12(4) of the Charter, the expulsion (or extraordinary rendition) of the applicant from Kenya to Nigeria by the respondents without a decision taken in accordance with the law of Kenya is unconstitutional as guaranteed under the pertinent provisions of CFRN and the Charter.”
Ejimakor also prayed the court to declare that ‘any criminal prosecution of the applicant the purpose of which the respondents unlawfully expelled the applicant from Kenya to Nigeria is illegal, and amounts to infringement of the applicant’s fundamental right to fair hearing, as enshrined and guaranteed under the pertinent provisions of CFRN and the Charter’.
The prayers also included: “An order of injunction restraining and prohibiting the respondents from taking any further step in any criminal prosecution of the applicant enabled by the said unlawful expulsion of the applicant from Kenya to Nigeria,” as well as an order “mandating and compelling the respondents to forthwith restitute or otherwise restore the applicant to his liberty, same being his state of being as of 19th June, 2021; and to thereupon repatriate the applicant to his country of lawful domicile (to wit: the United Kingdom) to await the outcome of any formal request the respondents may file before the competent authorities in Britain for the lawful extradition of the applicant to Nigeria.”
The suit demanded N25,000,000,000.00 damages from the federal government, and an apology letter published in three national dailies.
Recall that an Abia High Court had earlier ruled that Kanu did not jump bail in 2017. He is presently standing trial in an FCT High Court with charges on treason, jumping bail and running a proscribed group.
