IPOB LEADER MAZI NNAMDI KANU WAS ABDUCTED BY NIGERIAN GOVERNMENT.

ICHEOKU says if it is the Interpol, every country that is a signatory to it honors the request of any other signatory country to extradite any of its citizen who it accuses of a crime but who took up refuge in the host country. But Mazi Nnamdi Kanu is a British citizen with full residential rights in Britain and is not just ordinarily taking refuge in Britain, so what happened to his British citizenship? Why did the Boris Johnson British government acquiesce to his abduction under the color of arrest and agreed to his extradition to Nigeria and not refuse the request by Nigerian government since he is a British citizen? If he was abducted from another country, when will 10 Downing Street demand his release and return back to London as a British citizen who not subject to Nigerian jurisdictional authority?

It will be abhorable if the British government does not protect a British citizen Mazi Nnamdi Kanu from his native country Nigeria's government quest for vengeance and retribution. Such indifference will only demonstrates that some foreign citizenships are not necessarily worth their weight in gold and that they do not protect their naturalized citizens with the same vigor they protect their native born citizens. What then will such naturalized citizenship still be worth when such adopted country cannot protect the holder of its such citizenship. How can Britain permit such an abominable act and not defend and protect Mazi Nnamdi Kanu from the long arm of a country from which he ran away from, denounced and disavowed before taking British citizenship; especially when he is fighting for freedom and is against human rights violations in Nigeria. 

Although the details of his arrest: how he was arrested, where he was arrested and how he was brought back to Nigeria are still sketchy, but he is now in the custody of Nigeria government in Abuja. If the statement of Nigeria's Attorney General is any guide, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu was abducted from a foreign country and flown back to Nigeria in the dead of the night on June 27th, 2021. According to his office, Nnamdi Kanu has been "intercepted" and brought back to Nigeria to continue his ongoing trial after disappearing from the country. A trial bothering on terrorism, treasonable felony, managing an unlawful society, publication of defamatory matter and illegal possession of firearms. According to the AG, upon jumping bail, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu engaged in subversive activities including inciting of violence through television, radio and online broadcasts against the Nigerian state and institutions. 

ICHEOKU says the operative word here is "intercepted" which connotes that Mazi Nnamdi Kanu was literally hijacked enroute a destination which is not Nigeria. He was in another country or  going there when the Nigeria government forced the issue and had him detained, handed over to the Nigeria authorities and flown back to Nigeria. It means that the Nigerian government literary kidnapped Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and forcibly took him hostage back to Nigeria. It reminds ICHEOKU of the Umaru Dikko attempted kidnap in London in 1985 when the same Muhammadu Buhari was head of State in Nigeria. The then former Transport Minister in the President Shehu Shagari government which Muhammadu Buhari military junta had overthrown in a military coup, was on self exile in London when Muhammadu Buhari's regime contracted some international kidnappers to kidnap and bring him back to Nigeria. 

They nearly succeeded with the piracy as they had kidnapped Umaru Dikko, drugged him, put him in a shipping crate and were waiting for a Nigerian plane to evacuate the load at Stansted airport back to Nigeria when they were busted. But for Umaru Dikko's secretary who witnessed the kidnap and notified Scotland Yard which sent a country wide alert, the customs would not have known to detain the plane which was about to take off for Nigeria and discovered Umaru Dikko with three of his kidnappers inside the container marked as "Diplomatic baggage." So, is it possible that Mazi Nnamdi Kanu suffered the same Umaru Dikko's experience, admitted his own succeeded as he has now been "brought" back to Nigeria. From the way he was looking, very despondent and disheveled, he could still be suffering from whatever was injected into his body. 

ICHEOKU says now that Mazi Nnamdi Kanu has been apprehended with the help of Interpol and flown back to Nigeria to continue with his ongoing but temporarily suspended trial, with probably an amended charge sheet to include a retinue of other charges, what becomes of IPOB. Who will step in his shoes and what is the fate of the millions of Biafran people who have invested their hope in the promise of a Biafra rebirth now that their champion and chief promoter of the Biafra project is in the custodial detention of their chief traducer, the Nigeria State. Will it be a case of cut off the snake's head and watch the rest of the body wither away or will the Nigeria State act differently in order not to provoke a resort to full armed resistance and struggle by millions of his followers. 

How will the Nigeria State play its hand going forward, aware that the world have taken notice of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu and will be paying very close attention to the latest development, admitted discreetly. Unfortunately, there is no clearly discernible apparent authority figure in the IPOB who can effectively step into Mazi Nnamdi Kanu's shoes and effectively continue to pilot the affairs of IPOB. It is one sad thing about how he ran the organization so far, too much centralized authority without a functional organizational chart and instituted hierarchical order of succession, through which another leader can emerge to continue leading the struggle. 

If only he had in place, a decentralized organization without being the sole face and "administrator of IPOB, his deputy would have immediately stepped in to continue holding the forte and navigating the tiller of IPOB ship pending whatever happens. But like with so many people, there was a rift between him and his former deputy Mazi Uche Mefor and it led to the elimination of the "office" of a deputy leader of IPOB. Now, that decision has come to haunt IPOB as there is no one to automatically step in to carry the mantle of leadership in his absence. 

However, the good news is that no matter what becomes the final fate of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, whether he is hung or sent to prison for life, what he accomplished cannot be easily dismissed. He has introduced Biafra to millions of people all over the world and rekindled the spirit of Biafra in the hearts of millions of Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB), many of who were not even born when Biafra was first conceived and fought for. 

There is a new spirit in the land of Biafra that fervently craves for an independent State of Biafra and no amount of intimidation, kidnapping, torture and killing, including the possibility of convicting and even executing Mazi Nnamdi Kanu can ever erase. Instead it will make the agitation for Biafra more relentless as new leaders will emerge to carry on the flag and many more will still rise in the future to continue with the struggle. 

When Odumegwu Ojukwu first conceived the idea of an independent Biafra nation and went to war for it, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu was still a baby in diapers. Nobody ever knew that 50 odd years later that he will rise to become a leader of IPOB pursuing the same independent Biafra business. It is evident that nobody can ever kill an idea, regardless of how many of the people sharing the idea that are killed, imprisoned, tortured, kidnapped and/or purposefully marginalized and dehumanized. The Jews thought that by killing Jesus Christ that his preaching against some aspects of Judaism will simply disappear, but look where followers of Christ have taken his message, globally. The leadership in Ankara thought that by imprisoning Ocalan that PKK will just wilt away, but PKK has not disappeared several decades after. 

Even the Catalonia agitation in Spain is still giving the government in Madrid sleepless nights, wondering what next to do to resolve the issue. Western Polisario Front is still ongoing till today, so many decades following their desire to be separated from Morocco. Yasser Arafat's PLO gave birth to a Palestinian government in Ramallah and the Gaza Strip. So yes, freedom fighting is not easy and it is not a task for the faint hearted or the 'I want it now" crowd. No, it is not a walk in the park or an endeavor which accommodates time or the consciousness of watch wearers. As Nelson Mandela once said, there is no easy walk to freedom anywhere; and many freedom fighters pass through the valley of the shadow of death several times before reaching the mountaintop of their desired freedom. 

ICHEOKU prays that this latest tribulation of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, his arrest, is the last valley of the shadow of death which he will pass through. That with it, he has made the last and final payment in the installation payment for Biafra which down payment was made by Odumegwu Ojukwu in 1966 and now he will reach the mountain top of the realization of Biafra. He has sacrificed so much personally with leading the agitation for Biafra through the IPOB and has earned the right to be rewarded with a Biafra come through. He fought the good fight and now ought to reap the reward. 

May Chukwu Okeke Abiam protect him, guard his mouth from eating or drinking any compromised edible, solid or liquid; and also put a steel shield as an overcoat over his body and make it impenetrable and impermeable to any toxins, whether injected or aerosolized. It is well with Biafra and Mazi Nnamdi Kanu's name is indelibly added to the pantheons of great people to have ever walked the soil of Biafra. God be with him IJN.