Igbo leaders have sustained their pressure on the Federal Government for the release of the embattled leader of the Independent Peoples of Biafra, Nnamdi Kanu, with a visit to the Attorney-General of the Federation, Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, in Abuja.
Senators from the South-East numbering 15, led by a former Abia State Deputy Governor, Senator Enyinnaya Abaribe, met with the AGF to plead with President Bola Tinubu for Kanu’s release.
They also submitted a letter to the AGF seeking a political solution to the criminal charges against Kanu.
The visit happened 24 hours after the South-East Governors’ Forum at its meeting resolved to approach the President to rethink the continual detention of the IPOB leader.
The clamour for a political solution to Kanu’s case has heightened recently with Igbo political and traditional leaders, including the apex Igbo socio-cultural group, Ohanaeze Ndigbo, pressing the Federal Government to drop the terrorism charges against the IPOB leader.
Kanu, who pleaded not guilty to the charges, has been in the custody of the Department of State Services since June 2021after he was repatriated from Kenya.
The Federal High Court in Abuja on March 19, 2024, rejected the IPOB leader’s bail application.
However, the trial judge, Justice Binta Nyako, granted an accelerated hearing instead.
At the same time, Kanu’s counsel, Alloy Ejimakor, stated that his client’s health condition was deteriorating, adding that his continued detention by the DSS was a threat to his life.
In collaboration with other Igbo leaders, the Imo State Governor, Hope Uzodinma and his Abia counterpart, Okezie Ikpeazu, have also been involved in the push for Kanu’s release, citing the need for peace and stability in the South-East region.
Ohanaeze Ndigbo, in a statement last Sunday, tasked all the five South-East governors and traditional and religious leaders to work as a team to push for Kanu’s release from custody.
Also, the lawmaker representing Ikwuano/Umuahia North/Umuahia South Federal Constituency in Abia State, Obi Aguocha, sought the intervention of former President Muhammadu Buhari to secure Kanu’s freedom.
A statement issued on Sunday by Aguocha’s media team quoted the federal lawmaker as telling Buhari in his Daura country home, “For the missteps, utterances, and ill gestures of the past, especially on the part of my constituent and brother, Nnamdi Kanu, I am deeply sorry.”
Aguocha recently led 50 members of the House of Representatives drawn from across the six geopolitical zones to sign a letter appealing to Tinubu to direct Fagbemi to invoke section 174(1)(c) of the 1999 Constitution as amended and section 107 of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act, 2015, in setting the pathway to reaching the desired outcome.
