IPOB Slams Tinubu Government For Plotting To Use Nnamdi Kanu’s Detention In Sokoto Prison To Secure Northern Votes
IPOB Slams Tinubu Government For Plotting To Use Nnamdi Kanu’s Detention In Sokoto Prison To Secure Northern Votes
The group also accused the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) of using Kanu’s transfer to Sokoto Prison as a political maneuver to secure Northern political support, alleging that the decision was designed to portray the IPOB leader as an ethnic trophy.
The Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) has accused the British government of complicity in the alleged “abduction” and extraordinary rendition of its leader, Nnamdi Kanu, from Kenya to Nigeria, describing his detention, prosecution and eventual life imprisonment as part of a longstanding colonial strategy against the people of the Southeastern Nigeria.Nigerian news analysis
The group also accused the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) of using Kanu’s transfer to Sokoto Prison as a political maneuver to secure Northern political support, alleging that the decision was designed to portray the IPOB leader as an ethnic trophy.
IPOB made the allegations in a statement issued on Tuesday, November 10,.by its Media and Publicity Secretary, Emma Powerful, in response to comments by Bishop Godfrey Onah on Britain’s historical role in Nigeria’s political and economic structure.
Bishop Onah, the Catholic Bishop of Nsukka Diocese, had stated in a viral sermon that Britain never truly left Nigeria and remains the primary obstacle to the realisation and sovereignty of an independent Biafran state.
The cleric argued that the absence of an independent Biafra is not primarily due to Nigerian opposition, but rather deliberate intervention and continued geopolitical maneuvering by Britain.
According to him, Britain orchestrated Nigeria’s nominal independence without giving it true, functional sovereignty, designing political structures meant to protect its own strategic and economic interests in Africa.
Bishop Onah referenced the 1966 coup, the mistreatment of young officers, and the civil war, alleging that the suppression of Biafra, including the use of starvation, was a calculated effort backed or enabled by external Western powers, including the UK, US, France, and Italy, to prevent a progressive African nation from altering the continent’s political map.
The bishop framed the ongoing struggle for Biafran self-determination as an uphill battle against external neo-colonial forces rather than just an internal Nigerian dispute, urging patience and reflection among young people.
“If we don’t have the independent state of Biafra now, it is because Britain didn’t want it, not because Nigerians didn’t want it. Because they know that if Biafra had succeeded as an experiment, Africa would have been redesigned and would have been put on the part of progress and development that would have been to the disadvantage of Europe and the Western World,” Bishop Onah said.
IPOB said that Bishop Onah’s intervention has reinforced its longstanding position that Britain’s colonial legacy and subsequent diplomatic involvement contributed significantly to the historical injustices and structural inequalities affecting the South-East region of Nigeria.
IPOB specifically accused Britain of complicity in Kanu’s “abduction” in Kenya by the Nigerian government, and his rendition to Nigeria, disregard for United Nations calls for his release, and the failure to address court decisions concerning his improvement.
The group also questioned the legal basis of Kanu’s conviction, insisting that the Nigerian government relied on repealed laws and harsh judicial measures to sustain his prosecution.
According to the group, these developments represent a continuation of British geopolitical interests dating back to the 1967 Nigerian Civil War, when, it alleged, foreign economic interests took precedence over justice and the protection of human lives.
IPOB further accused the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) and other Western media organisations of promoting what it described as an anti-Kanu narrative through online search results and media coverage.
The group claimed that searches for Kanu’s name on international search engines such as Google predominantly produce negative reports, which it alleged have helped shape public perception and obscure alleged atrocities against eastern Nigeria.
IPOB also accused the British Government of maintaining diplomatic silence despite Kanu’s British citizenship and the circumstances surrounding his arrest and continued prosecution.
On Kanu’s transfer to Sokoto Prison, IPOB alleged that the decision was politically motivated and orchestrated by the APC-led government to exploit ethnic and religious divisions ahead of future political contests.
The group claimed that the transfer was intended to present Kanu to the Northern political establishment as an ethnic trophy and influence voting calculations involving prominent opposition figures, including former Vice President Atiku Abubakar.
IPOB, however, claimed that the alleged political strategy had backfired, insisting that sections of the Northern population and Fulani leaders were unhappy with what it described as attempts to use them as instruments in political manoeuvring.
The group also rejected statements attributed to Justice James Omotosho during Kanu’s trial, particularly the description of the IPOB leader as someone who “hates the North with a passion.”
IPOB described the judicial comments as deliberate distortions of Kanu’s position, insisting that the separatist leader’s campaign was directed against what the group considers a corrupt political and neo-colonial structure rather than any ethnic or religious community.
“Any person intimate with Mazi Nnamdi Kanu’s broadcasts will testify that he does not hate any ethnic group; he fights strictly against a corrupt, neo-colonial structure designed to trade the blood and resources of the masses for elite political survival,” Powerful stated.
IPOB maintained that Bishop Onah’s intervention represented growing support for what it described as the peaceful emancipation of Biafra.
The group warned that alleged media manipulation, judicial intimidation, political manoeuvring and international complicity would not stop its campaign.
“No amount of search engine manipulation, judicial blackmail, political horse-trading, or international collusion will stop the ultimate triumph of justice,” IPOB declared.
The statement comes amid continuing controversy surrounding Kanu’s prosecution, his conviction and imprisonment, as well as renewed debates over the circumstances of his return to Nigeria from Kenya and the legal and diplomatic implications of the case.
IPOB reiterated its demand for justice for Kanu and the South-East people, insisting that the British Government must take responsibility for what it described as its historical and continuing role in Nigeria’s political crisis.
