Court orders FG to return Nnamdi Kanu to Kenya and pay him N500m as damages for his illegal extradition
Court orders FG to return Nnamdi Kanu to Kenya and pay him N500m as damages for his illegal extradition
Justice E.N Anyadike of a Federal High Court sitting in Umuahia, the Abia State capital, today October 26, ordered the Federal Government to return the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, Nnamdi Kanu to Kenya from where he was extradited and pay him the sum of N500 million as damages following his illegal abduction and human rights abuse from Kenya.
Recall that Kanu was extradited from Kenya to Nigeria on June 19, 2021.
The Court presided by Justice E . N Anyadike, insisted that the extradition of Kanu from Kenya without recourse to the legal process was a flagrant abuse of his fundamental human rights.
Kanu, through his counsel, Aloy Ejimakor, had approached the court challenging his extradition from Kenya on June 19, 2022. Ejimakor told the court that the suit is sui generis (of a special class) and was primarily aimed at redressing the infamous unlawful expulsion or extraordinary rendition of Kanu, which 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 argued that the federal government should be required to show the legal document or authority that served as the foundation for his “abduction or extraordinary rendition.” Among the several reliefs sought, Kanu through his counsel asked the court for “an order mandating and compelling the respondents to pay the sum of N25,000,000,000.00 (Twenty-Five Billion Naira) to the applicant, being monetary damages claimed by the applicant against the respondents jointly and severally for the physical, mental, emotional, psychological, property and other damages suffered by the applicant as a result of the infringements of applicant’s fundamental rights by the respondents”.
Delivering a ruling on the suit, the presiding judge held that the extradition of Kanu from Kenya without recourse to the legal process was a flagrant abuse of his fundamental human rights. She also held that the respondent failed to disprove the claims of the applicant that he was arrested, blindfolded, tortured
