The Federal Government of Nigeria has filed an amended seven-count charge against Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), before a Federal High Court in Abuja.
Kanu was arrested in Kenya in June and extradited to Nigeria to face trial for alleged treason. He is expected to appear in court on Thursday, October 21, to commence his trial.
The new charges filed by the FG border on treasonable felony and terrorism following the pending charges he was facing since 2016.
FG claimed that Kanu had “on or about April 28, 2015, in London, the United Kingdom done in a broadcast on Radio Biafra monitored in Enugu, Enugu State and other parts of Nigeria within the jurisdiction of this honourable court, referred to Major General Muhammadu Buhari, GCON, President and Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces of the Federal Republic of Nigeria as a paedophile, a terrorist, an idiot and an embodiment of evil, knowing same to be false and you thereby committed an offence contrary to section 375 of the Criminal Code Act, Cap C. 38 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004”.
FG further alleged that Kanu incited violence in some parts of the country, in which they noted that the accused said that violence is the language people in the ‘zoo’ understand.
According to the FG, Kanu said that “if they fail to give us Biafra, Somalia will be a child’s play; Somalia will look like paradise. We will kill everybody in that zoo called Nigeria. If they fail to give us Biafra, there will be no more living in the zoo.”
The IPOB leader was also accused of seeking to carve out the Republic of Biafra from South East, South-South, parts of Kogi, and Benue states against Section 41(c)of the Criminal Code Act, 2004.
Other charges levelled against Kanu include, “That you Nnamdi Kanu, male adult of Afarachukw lbeku Umahia North Local Government Area of Abia State between the month of March and April 2015 imported into Nigeria and kept in Ubulusiizor in Ihiala Local Government Area of Anambra state within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court, a Radio transmitter known as TRAM 50l concealed in a container of used household Which you declared as used household items and you thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 47 (2) of the Criminal Code of Act, Cap C45, Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004.
“On May 16, 2021, in the London United Kingdom within the jurisdiction of this honourable court did commit and act in furtherance of an act of terrorism by making a broadcast that “in two weeks, what will happen will shake the world, people will die, the whole world will stand still mark my word”, and you thereby committed an offence contrary to and punishable under Section 1 (2) (h) of the Terrorism Prevention Amendment Act, 2013.”
Meanwhile, a Pro-Biafra group, the Biafra Nations League (BNL), has called for the shutdown of borders between Nigeria and Southern Cameroon, in solidarity with the trial of the Nnamdi Kanu on October 21.
