A Federal High Court in Umuahia, Abia, is to deliver judgment in the extraordinary rendition suit filed by Nnamdi Kanu, the leader of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB).
Aloy Ejimakor, Special Counsel to Kanu, had filed the suit before the court in March.
Kanu is asking the court to redress his infamous unlawful expulsion or extraordinary rendition from Kenya by the Federal Government.
Justice Evelyn Anyadike fixed the date for judgment, after the adoption of addresses by the counsel to the plaintiff and the defendant.
Counsel to the plaintiff, in the originating summons described the suit as sui generis (of a special class).
He contended that the expulsion of extraordinary rendition of Kanu, is a clear violation of his fundamental rights under Article 12(4) of the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights, as well as Chapter IV of the Nigerian Constitution.
He asked the court to redress myriad of violations that came with Kanu’s rendition, such as torture, unlawful detention and denial of the right to fair hearing as required by law before anybody can be expelled from one country to the other.
Ejimakor also sought to halt Kanu’s prosecution and restore him to the status quo before his rendition on June 19, 2021.
However, the counsel to the respondent, Mr Simon Eno of the Federal Ministry of Justice, urged the court to dismiss the suit.
Eno described the suit as an abuse of court process, saying that the issues sought were already decided by Justice Benson Anya of the Abia State High Cout, in Jan. 19, 2022.
Ejimakor countered the defense counsel’s submission, saying that the court only decided that portion of violation of Kanu’s fundamental rights that occurred in 2017.
He explained that when he made claims that bordered on rendition, the court declined jurisdiction.
Kanu’s counsel said that the court did so on grounds that rendition, being related to extradition, lied within the exclusive jurisdiction of the Federal High Court.
According to him, this is what informed his decision to initiate the suit before the Federal High Court. (NAN)
