‘Nnamdi Kanu accepts Nigerian govt’s admission that conviction done without jurisdiction’ – IPOB

The Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, has declared that its leader, Nnamdi Kanu, agrees with the Nigerian government’s alleged admission that the Abuja Federal High Court presided by Justice James Omotosho “acted without jurisdiction” in convicting him.

Justice Omotosho, on November 20, 2025, convicted Kanu on terrorism charges filed against him by the Nigerian government and subsequently sentenced him to life imprisonment. The IPOB leader is currently serving a prison term in Sokoto prison.

IPOB had, in a statement released by its spokesman Emma Powerful to announce the commencement of proceedings in Kanu’s appeal at the Court of Appeal on June 5, 2026, claimed that the Nigerian government, in its cross-appeal, admitted that the Abuja Federal High Court convicted and sentenced Kanu without jurisdiction.

The cross-appeal was filed by the Nigerian government in response to the appeal filed by Kanu to challenge his conviction.

In a follow-up statement released by Powerful on Sunday, IPOB said Kanu “accepts in toto the Federal Government’s cross-appeal damning admission that the trial court acted without jurisdiction”, a development it described as a “total collapse” of the prosecution’s case, which “the Court of Appeal cannot cure”.

Further describing the alleged admission as “a spectacular self-inflicted wound by the APC-led Federal Government of Nigeria in its desperate attempt to keep Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi Kanu in perpetual bondage”, IPOB stated, “In its Notice of Cross-Appeal filed against the judgment of the Federal High Court, Abuja (Coram: Hon. Justice J.K. Omotosho), delivered on the 20th day of November, 2025, the Federal Government unequivocally declared in black and white that the trial court acted without jurisdiction when it imposed life imprisonment on counts 1, 2, 4, 5 and 6.

“Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi Kanu accepts this premise in toto. We adopt the Federal Government’s own words as our own. If the trial court acted without jurisdiction at the sentencing phase, then the entire sentencing exercise is a nullity ab initio. You cannot validly convict a man and then lack jurisdiction to sentence him on the same counts. That is judicial absurdity.”

IPOB insisted that, with the Nigerian government allegedly having admitted that the trial court acted without jurisdiction, it cannot, in the same breath, ask the Court of Appeal to uphold the conviction and sentence.

“The Federal Government has now supplied that fatal feature through its own pleading. With the greatest respect, the Court of Appeal lacks the power to repair, cure, or resuscitate what the respondent (Nigerian Government) itself has declared jurisdictionally dead.

“The FG cannot admit the sentencing phase was conducted without jurisdiction and, in the same breath, urge the Court of Appeal to impose the death penalty on that same rotten foundation.

“If the ill-thought-out cross-appeal orchestrated by the Attorney General of the Federation, Prince Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, Chief Awomolo, SAN, and the APC Presidency is aimed at intimidating Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi Kanu into renouncing Biafra, then they have grossly miscalculated. Mazi Nnamdi Kanu is the reincarnation of the indomitable Biafran spirit and will never yield to such cheap blackmail.

“This self-destructive cross-appeal is a clear manifestation of divine intervention and the inevitable collapse of the entire fabricated case against Onyendu. The Federal Government has handed us the sledgehammer to demolish their own conviction,” the statement said.

IPOB urged the Court of Appeal to do justice by dismissing the cross-appeal and allowing the appeal in its entirety, “leading to the immediate and unconditional release of Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi Kanu”.

“The world is watching. History is watching. No amount of judicial acrobatics or cheap intimidation can cure a fundamental lack of jurisdiction,” the statement added.

‘Nnamdi Kanu accepts Nigerian govt’s admission that conviction done without jurisdiction’ – IPOB