Activist urges Buhari to release Nnamdi Kanu as parting gift

[FILES] IPOB leader Nnamdi Kanu in court

An activist, Patricia Ozonu, has asked President Muhammadu Buhari to release the detained leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, as his parting gift to Ndigbo.

She, however, decried the continued detention of the separatist leader after the Federal High Court had ordered his release, stressing that the Federal Government was setting a dangerous precedence for the country’s survival by ignoring the directive.

Speaking, yesterday, Ozonu said that the manner the government handled Kanu’s case since he was re-arrested and repatriated to the country from Kenya was an indication that rule of law had no place in the country.

She added that Kanu’s continued detention  lent credence to allegations of ethnic bias being raised against the Federal Government, stressing that such might not have been meted to any other Nigerian outside the South East Region.

“After several months in the custody of the DSS, a competent court of the land granted him freedom, but instead of releasing him as ordered, the Federal Government went on appeal and had since been amending charges against him. Now, since that ruling which the government appealed was given, nothing tangible has come from the court sessions held other than adjournments…”

Ozonu said that the demand for separation by IPOB members was borne out of the desire to address the marginalisation of the region in the scheme of things in the country, regretting, however, that the government had misconstrued the intentions.

She noted that the group “is not a terrorist organisation and has no business bearing  dangerous weapons to achieve its objectives”, stressing that  all it wanted was to bring to the fore the deprivation, injustices, imbalance and unfairness in the way our leaders have administered the country against the Igbo which is an important segment of the country.”