Come Thursday, 20 November, the Federal High Court in Abuja handling the trial of the secessionist leader, Nnamdi Kanu, will reach a decision one way or the other. Either Kanu will be sent home to his people in Afara Ukwu, sentenced to a term in prison or some sanction of sorts will be administered on him.

It is remarkable that since the resumed hearing of his trial after the Supreme Court’s decision to nullify his acquittal by an Appeal Court, not much progress has been made. He has consistently stalled, advancing one reason or another, including health scares by his counsels, for why the trial should not go ahead.

After the last hurdle was cleared by a team of the Nigerian Medical Association that certified him fit to undergo trial, Nnamdi Kanu set off a series of dramatic events in the court culminating with the abrupt dismissal of the most senior members of his defence team led by Chief Kanu Agabi. Going by Kanu’s previous and subsequent court performances, it is safe to say that what he did was to get rid of the mature members of his defence team that would not pander to his caprice. The likes of Aloy Ejimakor and Maxwell Opara who he shut down in open court with rude back slaps and a verbal reprimand not to speak “when I’m talking”, are useful tools (let’s not use a different word) that he can twist and turn in any direction.

They have been among the awed audience of admiring supporters that have stood as witnesses of Kanu’s court room tantrums and juvenile behaviour. They watched as he wasted the last day he had to open his defence insisting that the judge lacked jurisdiction. It is only right that Nnamdi Kanu should spend four years in DSS detention without his case making any progress. This is how he wanted things to go. He is an ordinary person, a failed Nelson Mandela. He misapplied the sentiments that justified his initial struggle.

What he wants is a political resolution of his trial. He said this much when he promised in his typically hyperbolic way to end in two minutes the insecurity and mindless orgy of killings, he had set off with his Radio Biafra broadcasts. The insecurity in the South-East is now a harmattan season fire, a conflagration that has gone beyond the farmstead wood heat he kindled and stoked into flames. After sentencing next week, his case may still have to be resolved politically, if only to satisfy a section of the South-East political establishment that believes his release would facilitate the return of peace in the region. The truth, however, is that the nature of insecurity in the South-East has outgrown what Nnamdi Kanu started.

He seized the imagination of his people by feeding their sense of political lack and inclusion. But more opportunists, have since risen and until the government defeats them, Kanu’s words upon his release will be of no avail. His desire for a political settlement is both selfish and self-serving. It’s the only way he can avoid humiliation and total demystification should he end up in jail like Simon Ekpa. He is in the same league as Abubakar Shekau, Dogo Gide and Bello Turji, whose actions have brought unspeakable misery to millions. Those who compare him to Sunday Igboho are either mistaken or dishonest. Igboho limited his action to confront Fulani invaders of his homeland. He was/is a self-determination activist.

He did not take his campaign beyond that level. What connected him to Kanu was his uneducated vituperation and arrogant excoriation of those who had better grasp of the issues he was taking on and that could have guided him. Kanu on the other hand was a secessionist who promoted inter-ethnic conflict through his hate utterances. His #ENDSARS broadcast for the destruction of Lagos is available. He sponsored and promoted attacks on military and paramilitary operatives and formations, leading to the elimination of many. The Igbo he claims to be fighting for are the worst victims of his armed campaign.

To hinge his release on the argument that he was illegally brought into the country is to misunderstand the import and nature of international law as it concerns a country’s national interest or extraordinary rendition which has been a favoured counter-terrorism weapon of foreign powers like the Israeli government in the wake of the Holocaust and the United States of America following 9/11. The major argument against it stems from how the George W. Bush administration used it. It violates the UN Convention Against Torture but in its post-9/11 iteration, it involved the secret transfer of accused persons to undisclosed locations where torture tactics like water boarding and electric shocks were used to extract information.

In addition to violating the sovereignty of affected countries, it results in the profiling of people, especially Muslims that were the overwhelming target of such attacks after 9/11. Otherwise extraordinary rendition is a means through which countries seek redress against fleeing felons like terrorists or anyone guilty of serious crimes. It does not inherently wipe out anyone’s crime. Moreover, it is established law that the manner a criminal or felon is apprehended or evidence is obtained against them does not absolve them once the crime is proven. Nnamdi Kanu and his supporters cannot demand freedom on grounds of how he was brought to justice or the fact that the crimes he is accused of occurred outside Nigeria. Millions died and their properties were ruined on the strength of his commands here in Nigeria.

If any country should feel aggrieved by the manner of his return to Nigeria, it should be Kenya which probably facilitated his return. They have not complained. Nor has the United Kingdom whose passport Kanu bears. It broke diplomatic relations with Nigeria for two years after Umaru Dikko was rescued by British Customs in a botched kidnapping at Stansted Airport on July 5, 1984. Which country is asking for the unconditional release of Kanu at this time?

Is it Finland that has jailed his sidekick for five years? Unlike what often happens in cases of official abductions, Kanu was arraigned in court, not taken to a secret location or eliminated upon arrival in Nigeria. He has not been tortured except his supporters expect him to be lodged in a five-star hotel. He looks well fed and has even added weight in detention. He is the one who stalled his own trial because of his unwillingness to be tried. Otherwise, he has been accorded his rights. Now Nigerians, the thousand and millions made homeless, orphaned or widowed etc, cry for justice and we demand no more nor less.

Source; Vanguard News