IPOB Says Sheik Jingir's Declaration Of Nigeria As Muslim Country Vindicates Nnamdi Kanu's Warnings
The Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, has expressed alarm over Sheikh Sani Yahaya Jingir’s declaration that Nigeria is a Muslim country and that Christians "are infidels,” while ordering dissenters to leave the country.
The Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, has expressed alarm over Sheikh Sani Yahaya Jingir’s declaration that Nigeria is a Muslim country and that Christians "are infidels,” while ordering dissenters to leave the country.
IPOB said that Jingir's declaration against that those who did not agree with his declaration should leave Nigeria was not a slip, but a confirmation of the prediction made by Nnamdi Kanu over a decade ago, and over which he was branded a terrorist and jailed.
These were contained in a statement signed by the IPOB's Spokesperson and Publicity Secretary, Comrade Emma Powerful, on Tuesday.
"IPOB insists that the persecution of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu is inseparable from the jihadist violence ravaging Nigeria and the Islamisation agenda about which he repeatedly warned.
"A prominent Islamic cleric declaring Nigeria a Muslim country, describing Christians as “infidels,” and demanding that those opposed to a Muslim-Muslim political arrangement leave the country cannot simply be brushed aside as meaningless rhetoric," it noted.
The statement read in part, "Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi Kanu is no terrorist. He is a whistleblower who exposed an organised design to alter Nigeria’s religious character and reduce indigenous Judeo-Christian peoples to second-class status in their own homeland. For that, he has paid an extraordinary price...
The statement read in part, "Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi Kanu is no terrorist. He is a whistleblower who exposed an organised design to alter Nigeria’s religious character and reduce indigenous Judeo-Christian peoples to second-class status in their own homeland. For that, he has paid an extraordinary price...
"Nnamdi Kanu was abducted in Kenya and extraordinarily rendered to Nigeria. He remained imprisoned despite the Court of Appeal’s October 13, 2022 judgment discharging him.
"Then came an unprecedented judicial sleight: a civil stay of execution was used to negate a criminal discharge—a functus officio court resurrected to suspend its own final criminal order. He was illegally re-arraigned by a contemnor, denied fair hearing, convicted under non-existent or repealed statutes incapable of sustaining any trial or grounding any conviction, sentenced to life, and dumped in Sokoto—the heart of the Jihadist Caliphate. Every step reeked of illegality and judicial recklessness.
"The United States Congress and the Israeli Knesset have been fully informed of the jihadist plans to Islamise non-Muslim populations in Nigeria and of the details of the persecution and prosecution of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu.
"They have been placed on notice of his extraordinary rendition from Kenya, his continued detention after the Court of Appeal discharged him, the unprecedented use of a civil stay of execution to negate a criminal discharge, his illegal re-arraignment, the denial of fair hearing, his conviction under non-existent or repealed statutes incapable of sustaining any trial or grounding any conviction, his life sentence, and his transfer to Sokoto.
"Sheikh Jingir’s declaration therefore does not arise in a vacuum. It provides further public evidence requiring international scrutiny of the danger about which Mazi Nnamdi Kanu has warned for more than a decade.
"Sheikh Jingir’s words now force the question Nnamdi Kanu has always asked: What future awaits Nigerians when powerful actors proclaim that the country belongs to one religion and that others should leave?
"Those who mocked Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi Kanu must now answer. Those who branded him a troublemaker must now answer. Those who dismissed his warnings as imaginary must now answer.
"And those who supported his persecution because they found his message inconvenient must confront what is now being said openly.
Time For Denial Over
"The time for denial is over.The constitutional issue in the case of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu is equally stark. No citizen can be tried and convicted unless the offence and penalty are prescribed by a written law in force. A non-existent statute creates no offence.
"A repealed statute cannot be resurrected. Yet Mazi Nnamdi Kanu was convicted on precisely that foundation. No judicial sophistry can turn a dead law into a living penal enactment.
"A court cannot manufacture criminal jurisdiction from a statute that does not exist. Nor can a repealed penal statute, incapable of sustaining a trial, be judicially revived to ground a conviction. The Constitution requires a written law in force—not a judicial reconstruction of a dead enactment after the fact.
"That constitutional outrage was preceded by something equally extraordinary. After the Court of Appeal discharged Mazi Nnamdi Kanu on October 13, 2022, a civil stay of execution was deployed to negate a criminal discharge.
"A civil procedural device was thus used to keep a discharged defendant imprisoned after the criminal appellate court had pronounced its judgment. The court that had completed its criminal adjudication was resurrected to purportedly suspend the consequence of its own final criminal order.
"This was not some harmless procedural irregularity. It became the bridge between a criminal discharge and the continued imprisonment and eventual re-arraignment of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu.
Question The Nigerian Government must answer.
"Is Nigeria a secular constitutional republic belonging equally to Christians, Muslims, traditional worshippers and citizens of no religion, or is it a religious fiefdom in which one constituency may claim ownership of the country and tell everybody else to vacate?
"The Constitution provides one answer;
Sheikh Jingir has provided another.
The Nigerian Government must tell the world which one it stands by.
"The relentless advance of jihadist groups and Fulani bandits into indigenous southern territories will never be accepted as the destiny of our people. Nnamdi Kanu warned of this danger long before many of those now expressing concern were prepared to acknowledge it.
"That is why powerful interests have worked so hard to keep him behind bars. A free Onyendu Mazi Nnamdi Kanu remains their greatest obstacle.
But imprisoning the man does not erase his words.
"The mask is slipping.The warnings once ridiculed are being vindicated by events and by the increasingly brazen declarations now being made in public.
His warnings cannot be imprisoned.
Truth cannot be extraordinarily rendered.
History cannot be sentenced to life in Sokoto.
"The case of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu forces Nigeria—and the world—to confront the rule of law, religious equality, judicial independence, self-determination and state accountability.
"If a citizen can be abducted abroad, extraordinarily rendered into Nigeria, kept imprisoned after being discharged by an appellate court, subjected to a civil stay of a criminal discharge, re-arraigned by a contemnor, denied fair hearing and ultimately convicted under non-existent or repealed statutes incapable of grounding a criminal conviction, then the danger extends far beyond one defendant.
"It threatens every person who expects the protection of written law. That is why this appeal is bigger than one man..."
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