 You're welcome back to The Reckless on PlotsTV Africa. It's now time for our second big conversation and it's about Namdi Kanu. He was arrested allegedly on Sunday, June 27th, 2021 and all the dynamics of the case seems to be changing because the UK government has gotten involved and we're basically discussing Namdi Kanu and the Nigerian state. Public Affairs Analyst joins us now to talk about this. Good morning, Mr Kolauli. Good morning, my sister. Let's first get where you stand regarding the arrest of Namdi Kanu. Many people say this is, especially iPop leaders, that this is basically a kidnap and not an extradition. Absolutely. I agree that this is a kidnap. And it wouldn't be the fault of the cabinet in this country, especially under President Muhammad Kolauli. You will remember that when he was in the state, between 1985, it similarly dispatched a Nigerian security organization and the Israeli Mossad, the one kidnap Alai Umar Utriko in the United Kingdom in London and bring the unfortunately part to Nigeria. Alai Umar Utriko was arrested and he was injected with some sleeping substances put in a crate. And was about to be shipped to Nigeria. But please for Alai Umar Utriko, his neighbors saw what happened when he was a kidnap and then they alerted the precinct police and those concealed up. The airport, their seaport and all the land borders. And they found Alai Umar Utriko in a crate where it was put on all the ships on the way to Nigeria. So what has happened to Namdi Kanu is similar to that. If Nigeria has issues with Namdi Kanu and Namdi Kanu is resident in the UK, what Nigeria ought to have done is to not deal with the British Open Office or the Eastern Africa Ministry in Britain and then they will apply for a sufficient of Namdi Kanu back to Nigeria. But the fact that they didn't do that made this one look like the pink one. And when you also look at where we are told Nigeria has been caught in, which is in Kenya, I'm not sure whether Nigeria had a service treaty with Kenya. So this is something that has been drawn outside the context of them all. Okay. So is this part of the conversation important with his trial? Is it going to play any role whatsoever with the trial? The trial. Yes. When it resumes on the 26th of July, the part where of course you've mentioned that he may not have been brought back to the country legally, is that going to play any importance? Before I talk about the trial, let me quickly state that I think it might not be on the official station. I have said it before on modern stations that I do hope that Namdi Kanu does not make a cast of mistakes that don't make you commit when he was with the administration of the Afra. Here is a Namdi Kanu who is leading a revolutionary struggle and doesn't appear to be prepared so to say or has never done what is expected of him. He got to have known that Nigerians authorities were tracking him and that he was going to do whatever was necessary to ensure that he was the proper Nigerian. So he got to have arranged a tactical, a random test. He had to have sought the approval of the British authorities, the British government, to provide protection for them. You remember the case of Salmon Roche, when Salmon Roche wrote a book and named the Iranian authorities and another pronounced the fat one on Roche. The British authorities had to take responsibility to provide protection for Roche and the American authorities I think is in the US now. The American authorities are the ones providing the security for him. So Namdi Kanu also has made similar arrangements. Furthermore, if you are a British fighter, you also have made your own security arrangements so that wherever you are holding, you will always be protected by your own security guard so that what happened to him in Kent is where he was sent. Intercepted and compacted in Nigeria could not easily have happened. Furthermore, I have never supported Namdi Kanu this in Nigeria for whatever reason. If you are living in a British struggle, you are supposed to stay with your people and live there to the thick and thick of that struggle. In fact, my take is that if you have to be in military fatigue with the INS and in the bush and in bunkers, live in a struggle personally. Occasionally, in whatever circumstances or fights that those people are engaging with the authorities are not allowed to go and live in a British and they live in the struggle on Facebook, on Twitter, and what have they. You know of these incidents of murder with a British fighter. Mandela did not run away from his people when he was living in the struggle. Kenneth Kanban never left the country when he was living in the struggle. Even Mr. Denny, who is president in Uganda now, he didn't leave his people when he was living them in the struggle. So it is not proper for Namdi Kanu to have a left in Nigeria to be constantly struggling for independence. In fact, when he was living, he also did the thickest thing of the struggle himself. With regards to the trial, there is also a lot of challenges in there. If the authorities are going to follow the rules and the letters of the law, what is a British citizen and if they are going to be trying to be a British citizen in Nigeria for trying to overthrow the government or for carrying out a decision, I mean, living a decision is something in Nigeria. Or if you accuse the point of christening up and loaning, there are so many options that you have to cross to be able to grant the conviction because that's the way we are told. Namdi Kanu is a character in the British passport. Furthermore, you will also need proof the fact that Namdi Kanu has been making noise on Twitter, on Facebook and some of his viewers are social media. It might not be enough to grant the conviction. You must be able to ascertain and put the facts on the ground. Concrete evidence that he actually initiated some of those egregious allegations that they have brought against him. More importantly, meeting the decision with all the support of the court and the defendants shouldn't be a crime under the law. The United Nations tries to recognize the right of people to speak sense of determination. The Africans try to equally recognize this, the fact that there is a problem. The Nigerian constitution itself makes provisions for freedom of association and opinion. If the people freely are not uncomfortable within the Nigerian nation, what the Nigerian constitution has to do is to organize a referendum to determine whether that constitution is popular among the Igbo people. That leads to my next point. Other illegal practitioners have argued that there is no provision for a referendum in Nigeria and that until there is a constitutional amendment to include calls and provisions for a referendum, any agitation or secession for a separate state is illegal. Where do you stand regarding that? That is the gross misunderstanding of the law. The law provides for freedom of association and opinion. If you have a situation which has a part of the country agitating that no one wants to be part of a part of Nigeria, all that executives may require to do is to take a bill to the National Assembly and tell them we want to conduct a referendum to determine whether the constitutional independence of the other is popular among the Igbo people. That can be done. The president can also sign an executive order saying that the issue of what is happening is because of the force mature. The force mature is an extraordinary occurrence in the environment. And there is also the doctrine of necessity with all those provisions under our law. A referendum can be insulated without any constitutional provisions. You don't need to put it in the constitution before you organize a referendum. My question is, in the absence of these provisions to call for a referendum, these executive orders, in the absence of these provisions, the calls for a separate Biafran state, is it legal or not? Hello. Can you repeat that question? You just mentioned the circumstances within which a referendum can take place. So I am saying, in the absence of all that with our current constitution, the way Nigeria is currently run, is it legal for Anambi Cano to be advocating for a separate Biafran state? Absolutely. It's legal. And I think Indonesia also broke away and there is also a conflict. Also, I think, in Singapore, also broke away from India after it got here independent. So if that is the case, you also go to Africa, who have looked at the African standard on the people's side. It makes conditions for self-determination for people. They also make conditions for it. And this one that the Nigeria political system said, freedom of association is not about politics. It's not about politics. Freedom to own opinion is not about politics. Freedom of association includes the right of people to say, look, we are being mistreated within the Nigeria politics, and we want to call for, we want to be independent about the separate mission of our state. All right. Yes, what is special? I don't know. It works now with the Cano, it's like a city of IT4. All right. I want you to speak on the cause for a fair trial. And, of course, the importance that the Nigerian government does grant him a fair trial. If you look back at where we're coming from the number of times that there were court rulings granting him bail that were, of course, ignored, what would you expect this time around? Do you have any assurances or trust that the Nigerian government will be able to give a completely fair trial to Nandikanu? And, of course, what must be done also to prevent his followers from making demands and maybe creating chaos across the country? What? If I get your question right, are we saying that there's what we should expect in the new trial? Yes, you know, how can we, how can we trust that the Nigerian government will give Nandikanu a fair trial? Is there things that you would, you know, you would, you know, expect this time around looking at how it was in the past? Well, let me say with due respect to most of our judges and most of our courts, they have always tried as much as possible that if we were to arrange before them a fair trial, if in complicated cases like that of AirBank and from other cases and all that, our courts have also always tried as much as possible to do justice. But in the case of Nandikanu, it's not a matter that should be decided in court. It's a political issue. It's not a matter to be decided in court. Taking into court to decide the political issue or the political matter, Nandikanu is not only to take justice. I suspect that they might be bringing frame charges against them that they have been responsible for the killing of policemen, which is Moka. He has tried to switch on Nigeria, which is a prison. He has been spending public property, which is a asset, and so many other egregious assets. Without all looking at what were the things that led to those things, all you couldn't have been born in a police station killing policemen without certain things being responsible for it. The killing that they have been doing for those who have lost their lives with due respect to their families, with due respect to the public property that they have been formed and known as we must have at least ten of these things in isolation. In justice, we always need to have some responses. The responses might not be too predictable for the city. The way in which the security people have also handled the challenges coming from the conflict, in the way we would have expected the kind of crisis that we have in those places to be. We require to ensure that this matter is handled politically and not as a conflict matter. Because if you approach it as a conflict matter and defend the kind of strategy that the society are running to bring in against it, you have to be a miscarriage of justice. And that means safety. And let me admonish the comment. When Mr. McDevara and his brothers and sisters were treated for independence at Africa and they were taken to countries that competed. Nobody killed them. These authorities in there are behaving like they were all people who are behaving. Nessie Mandela would not have been allowed to use the people to independence. Also to Kenya also go to Kedetan in this country. It is a country for some of these individuals to fight the war. Their cases are politically and nobody arranged them to take them with them to consider for murder, and send them to the Kano. Okay. I am still talking about being fair in Nambi Kano. Are you concerned about how the DSS or operatives would treat Nambi Kano in their custody regarding his upkeep and welfare? These concerns came up when we were talking about Ibrahim, who was exactly talking about how he was being fed and how he was sick in their custody. Do you have concerns that Nambi Kano would be cared for in DSS custody? I saw the humiliating treatment that Nambi Kano was given. They put him in a net chain. They put him in handcuffs. It was also a crime. That is not part and part of our law. When the person is put before the court, the law is that he will not be charged with any further whether handcuffs or net chains and what have you. And at the court, we always remain open for people to be able to come in and take their proceedings are going on. And at the end of the day, we are able to say I think a fair trial is going on in here. But in the case of Nambi Kano, he was assaulted by DSS and now this layer may only be taken to court with a not having access to his lawyer and now he is being put in jail and being put in prison. All these things are not what is expected for the court. But more importantly more importantly the truth of the matter is that if you have looked at the antecedents of the DSS, you will not be surprised about what they have done to Nambi Kano. That organization is a very important organization that should have no place under its democracy under its democracy in particular. Look at what happened already inside. Most of those who belong as you saw who were attacking DSS protesters and others why they couldn't fight the DSS and said something that came up may be innocent. Also look what has come to a danger due when it was a decision to release on the custody of the DSS. The higher talks more the way from Kano to go and attack the DSS and the other protesters in front of the Nigeria Human Rights Commission and other young people in Nigeria to provide the resources to take him to I think or whatever for treatment to save his life. And not to long ago there have been studies in which the DSS was arrested because of a semi-vice in the pattern. And even some people suspected to have participated in this process. We saw that the cons at the middle of the night breaking down doors, breaking down windows and even the police are casting away whatever money they find in these people that this is not the way DSS or the secret police also give. We would have to end the conversation here but of course thank you for stepping in and of course sharing your thoughts on the situation so far. We of course look forward to more developments and we will bring in you again. Thanks for your time this morning. Thanks for having me. This seems like it's going to be one of the biggest stories for the time that this case continues to go on even after. What I'm really looking forward to seeing is what the impact of the British High Commission would be in this case because like we've read in the papers this morning they volunteered to offer consular documents, they said they want to begin talks with the federal government so just how much impact would the involvement of the British government be in the case and trial of Namdi Kanu, that's still left to be seen. I think I understand what politics enough to also not take everything that I read from from wherever country hook, line and sinker. Especially since the backtrack they had offered asylum to IPOB leaders but then backtrack so yes there's still much left to be seen. This is expected but there's always something to play in the background that a lot of people will not be aware of. But we'll see of course we'll be here to report everything. Thanks for staying with us. Start in the month of July with us if you missed out on the conversations this morning including Pah Ayo Adi Banjo. You can catch up on our social media platforms at PLOS TV Africa on Facebook and Instagram. And yes please do not forget to subscribe to our new YouTube channel. And at PLOS TV Africa Lifestyle I am Annetta Felix. And I am Musaugi Ogbong. Bye bye.