FG Says Justice James Omotosho Had No Jurisdiction To Sentence Nnamdi Kanu To Life Jail
The Federal Government says that the Justice James Omotosho, who sentenced the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, Nnamdi Kanu, to life imprisonment "acted without jurisdiction," in the case.
The Federal Government says that the Justice James Omotosho, who sentenced the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, Nnamdi Kanu, to life imprisonment "acted without jurisdiction," in the case.
The government made its position known in its Brief of Argument filed today, before the Court of Appeal.
According to the IPOB Spokesman, Emma Powerful, "the respondent (Federal Republic of Nigeria) expressly admitted that Justice James Omotosho acted without jurisdiction" when it imposed the sentence of life imprisonment instead of death penalty, on Kanu.
According to Emma Powerful, the conviction and sentence are juridically inseparable, as "One cannot survive without the other," hence the government had destroyed its own case on Kanu 's trial.
IPOB's statement was titled, "The Omotosho Judgement Has Implicated The Nigerian Judiciary Itself: The Cross- Appeal Has Destroyed Any Hope Of Affirmance."
The statement read, "The global family of the IPOB under the supreme leadership of the only genuine prophet of our time, Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi OkwuChukwu Kanu, wishes to draw the attention of all reasonable Nigerians, the international community, members of the diplomatic corps, legal practitioners, human-rights organizations, and all defenders of constitutional government to a reality that can no longer be hidden.
"Today, 5/6/2026, our leader and prophet filed the long awaited appeal following Omotosho’s conviction judgment. The issue before the Court of Appeal in the case of Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi Kanu is no longer merely about one man.
"It is now about whether the Nigerian judicial system is prepared to remain a legal institution or whether it is prepared to openly repudiate its own foundational principles. Nigerian judiciary, from the Supreme Court to the lowest in the land is effectively on trial before the whole world starting from today.
"The judgment delivered by Justice James Omotosho on November 20, 2025, has created a crisis far bigger than the fate of Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi Kanu.
It has created a crisis of institutional credibility.
"What makes the situation extraordinary is that the Federal Government itself has now supplied one of the most devastating pieces of evidence against the judgment.
"In its Cross-Appeal as argued in the Brief of Argument filed today, the Respondent (Federal Republic of Nigeria) expressly admitted that Justice James Omotosho, acted without jurisdiction when it imposed the sentence of life imprisonment instead of death penalty.
"That admission changes everything.The Federal Government has effectively fired a cannon through the heart of the judgment it is simultaneously attempting to defend.
The implication is simple: Jurisdiction is not divisible.
"Jurisdiction is not a buffet from which a court may choose what portion it wishes to possess. Jurisdiction is not available for conviction but unavailable for sentencing. Jurisdiction is a continuum.
"A court either possesses jurisdiction throughout the proceedings or it does not. That principle has governed Nigerian law for decades.
"If the trial court lacked jurisdiction to impose sentence, as the Federal Government now asserts, then the same trial court lacked jurisdiction to produce the conviction from which the sentence supposedly arose. The conviction and sentence are juridically inseparable.
"One cannot survive without the other.
The Cross-Appeal therefore does not strengthen the Respondent's position.
It destroys it.
"The Federal Government has inadvertently converted itself into a witness against its own judgment.
"The danger this creates for the Nigerian judiciary cannot be overstated.
"Any attempt by the Court of Appeal to affirm the conviction while simultaneously accepting the Federal Government's admission regarding jurisdiction would require the creation of an entirely new species of criminal jurisprudence unknown to Nigeria, unknown to the Commonwealth, and unknown to the common-law world.
"The Court would effectively be saying that a trial court can lack jurisdiction and yet validly convict. No such principle exists. No such principle has ever existed. No respectable criminal justice system operates on that basis.
"But the Cross-Appeal is only one aspect of the problem the government has created for itself in their attempt to use the invocation of the death penalty to intimidate Onyendu into renouncing Biafra restoration. They instead shot themselves on the foot.
"The Appellant's Brief demonstrates that the judgment is burdened by multiple constitutional defects, each independently fatal to the proceedings.
"The Brief identifies eight separate issues, each capable on its own of nullifying the conviction.This is what many badly informed commentators have failed to understand.
"The appeal is not built upon a single argument. It is built upon multiple constitutional barriers. To affirm the judgment, an appellate court would have to overcome all of them simultaneously.
"It would have to uphold proceedings founded upon repealed statutes, which is not done anywhere in the world that practices common-law. Savings clause and Preservation provision is not the same. Savings clauses save liabilities accrued, not the penal statute itself. This is something 99.9% of legal commentators do not know.
"It would have to explain how a conviction can stand when the trial judge himself acknowledged that without a written law there can be no conviction. TPAA was not a written law in force in Nigeria as at 20 November 2025.
"It would have to explain why repeated demands to identify the extant law governing the prosecution went unanswered. Omotosho J, through Chief Awomolo SAN must now show the Court of Appeal and the whole world that law Omotosho J, refused to show Onyendu during the trial. No hiding place for them anymore.
"It would have to explain why the Appellant was denied final address and allocutus before judgment was delivered.
"It would have to explain how a court can state in its judgment that the Appellant did not testify when the record shows that he did.
"It would have to explain why jurisdictional objections reserved for determination were never determined. It would have to explain how a court can rely upon statutory provisions and legal theories never pleaded by the prosecution.
"It would have to explain how criminal convictions can be sustained while core investigative materials remain withheld.
"It would have to explain how constitutional safeguards can simply be ignored whenever a politically sensitive defendant is involved.
"In short, affirmance would require the judicial normalization of legal impossibilities. This is why the appeal has assumed significance far beyond the immediate parties.
"The Court of Appeal is no longer deciding merely whether Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi Kanu should be convicted. It is deciding whether long-established principles of Nigerian criminal law still mean what they say.
"The Nigerian judiciary now stands at a crossroads. One path preserves the integrity of constitutional government. "The other path requires the abandonment of principles repeatedly proclaimed by Nigerian courts over many decades. It is for this reason that IPOB says that Justice Omotosho's judgment has implicated the entire judicial establishment.
"Not because every judge participated in it. Not because every court endorsed it.
But because affirming it would require the institutional adoption of doctrines that would destabilize Nigerian criminal jurisprudence far beyond this particular case.
"The consequences would not end with Mazi Nnamdi Kanu. Every future criminal defendant would be entitled to ask whether jurisdiction still matters.
"Whether fair hearing still matters; whether extant written law still matters;
whether judicial notice still matters;
whether appellate discharge still matters and whether constitutional supremacy still matters.
"Those questions cannot be answered selectively. That is why the Cross-Appeal has become so devastating. In an attempt to seek a harsher punishment, the Respondent has undermined the very foundation upon which the judgment stands.
"The Federal Government has, in effect, informed the Court of Appeal that the trial court lacked jurisdiction. The question now becomes unavoidable:
If the trial court lacked jurisdiction, what exactly is left to affirm?
"IPOB therefore calls upon all defenders of constitutionalism, both within Nigeria and internationally, to closely observe these proceedings.
"The world is watching. History is watching. And the future credibility of the Nigerian judicial system may well depend upon the answer ultimately given by the Court of Appeal."
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