Today, Monday 26, 2021 marks a milestone in the history of the quest for separate development or independence sweeping across Nigeria. Today, the two exponents of the separatist agitations Sunday Igboho and Nnamdi Kanu, are on trial, one in Nigeria, the other in a neighbouring country.
One is in Nigeria fighting to be let off the hook to continue his struggle for the self-determination of his people, having been captured in another African country and bundled back. The other, in another African country, is fighting against being couriered back to Nigeria.
At the Federal High Court in Abuja, Abuja, the atmosphere is tense. Supporters of Nnamdi Kanu, the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, have arrived in support of their leader as his trial court resumes. But they are not allowed in. They are not discouraged. They gather by the roadside, dancing, chanting in support of Kanu, who has vowed to fight on. Soon, Police disperse them. Then some of them are arrested and the police drive them away.
Even journalists who had come to cover the trial were not allowed into the court, as Police prevented them from gaining access to the premises.
Kanu is fighting for the independence of the Southeast, which had also waged a three-year war against the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1967 to 1970. The war ended with the quest for Biafra defeated. Kanu, who has picked up the battle, was born in the year the war began, and could not have been more than a little boy by the time it ended.
His IPOB has created a unit called the Eastern Security Network. Many people do not understand the exact job of this unit, but it has been blamed for most of the attacks on security personnel and property in the Southeast and adjoining states. Most of these attacks have been blamed on what has become known as “UNKNOWN GUNMEN,” an expression that has become synonymous with ESN. IPOB denies the links.
In faraway Cotonou, capital of Benin Republic, Nigeria’s immediate neighbour to the west, a similar scene is playing out. Sunday Adeyemo, better known as Sunday Igboho, is also to appear in court. Igboho is the leader or chief agitator for the Yoruba Nation. He is championing the breakaway of the Yoruba race, the owners of Nigeria’s Southwest region, from the country.
Both separatist leaders have a lot in common. Kanu was arrested in a foreign country (he and his supporters say Kenya), and was repatriated back to Abuja, Nigeria’s capital. His re-arrest and transportation back to Nigeria took many by surprise. He left Nigeria in 2017, having jumped bail that year in a case of terrorism brought against him by the government.
The government announced that Kanu was arrested with the help of INTERPOL.
Igboho, on his part, was arrested in Cotonou a week ago, as he and his wife, Ropo tried to board a flight to run to Germany. Igboho, like Kanu, was running away from Nigeria after he was declared wanted by the Department of State Services, Nigeria’s secret police. That followed a night raid on his residence in the Soka area of Ibadan, the capital of Oyo State early this month.
The Spy Police said it recovered a cache of arms and ammunition during the raid. It later presented these to be seven AK-47 rifles allegedly recovered during the raid on Igboho’s house on July 1, as well as three pump-action guns, 30 fully charged AK-47 magazines, 5,000 rounds of 7.62mm ammunition, five cutlasses, one jack-knife, one pen knife, two pistol holsters, a pair of binoculars, a wallet containing $5, local and international driving licences in his name, ATM cards, a German residence permit No. YO2N6K1NY bearing his name, two whistles, 50 cartridges and 18 walkie-talkies.
Igboho denied these allegations, insisting that the items were the creation of the DSS. But the denial was not enough. He had to run for his dear life, and the next time Nigerians heard about him was after his arrest in Cotonou.
Like Kanu, Igboho has a large following of supporters for his cause. At the resumption of his trial in Cotonou on Monday, his supporters are said to have trooped to the court to show solidarity.
Among those who have arrived the Benin Republic early on Monday are two delegations from the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi, and the Olubadan of Ibadanland, Oba Saliu Akanmu Adetunji, Aje Ogungunniso 1.
They are in Benin to observe the proceedings of the court case involving Chief Sunday Adeyemo, better known as Sunday Igboho, Punch newspaper confirmed.
“Yes, they have arrived,” Olubadan’s Personal Assistant/Director of Media and Publicity, Adeola Oloko told The Punch.
Olubadan had said the delegation was sent in order to allay the fears of several people, including protesters who besieged his palace.
“Sunday Igboho lives in Ibadan, got married in Ibadan, rear children in Ibadan, built houses in Ibadan and as such he has the right to be protected by Ibadan Traditional Institution within the ambit of the law just like any human being in Ibadan.”
The first-class monarch also allayed public fears of a “repeat performance of Yoruba-Fulani coalition of 1814,” Punch said.
According to Oba Adetunji, students of Nigeria history may wish to be reminded that when some people during the period under reference chose to engage in territorial expansion to the sea, it took the Ibadan army under Balogun Oderinlo to repel the attack and stop the incursion near Osogbo.
