The convicted leader of the banned Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, who is serving a life sentence at the National Correctional Centre, Sokoto, for terrorism-related offences, has filed a Notice of Appeal at the Court of Appeal, challenging his conviction by the Federal High Court in Abuja on November 20, 2026.
Kanu, who filed the Notice of Appeal on Wednesday, and listed the Federal Republic of Nigeria as the respondent, urged the Court of Appeal to allow his appeal and to issue an Order of the Court of Appeal quashing his conviction on all the counts in the charge No. FHC/ABG/CR/383/2015 by the Federal High Court judge.
The appellant also seeks an order from the Court of Appeal under squashing, reversing and setting aside the sentences/punishment imposed on him by the Federal High Court judge. Fourthly, the appellant has asked the Court of Appeal for an order discharging and acquitting him in respect of all counts in charge FHC/ABG/CR/383/2015, and for such further orders as the Court of Appeal may deem fit to make.
The Notice of Appeal contains 22 grounds of appeal, in which he is vigorously contending, among others, that the trial judge erred in law, that his preliminary objections and pending bail application were ignored, and that he was convicted despite a prior Court of Appeal ruling declaring earlier proceedings a nullity.
He also argued that the trial judge “erred in law by failing to resolve the procedural and competence consequences” arising from the disrupted 2017 trial.
In other grounds set out in the Notice of Appeal, the appellant accused the trial judge of misdirection in treating his absence from Nigeria as adverse. He also said he was convicted under a repealed law, retried on overlapping facts, and sentenced without consideration of mitigation or ‘allocutus’, among others.
Recall that Kanu was first arrested in October 2015 and charged with offences including treasonable felony and unlawful possession of arms. He was granted bail in 2017 but fled Nigeria after soldiers reportedly raided his home. He was rearrested in Kenya in June 2021 and brought back to Nigeria to face trial on seven terrorism-related counts.
