Ibekimi Oriamaja Reports
Nnamdi Kanu, the embattled leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), has taken the Federal Government to the Supreme Court over his continued detention.
Kanu, in a three-ground appeal filed through his team of lawyers led by a frontline constitutional lawyer, Mike Ozekhome, SAN, is challenging the ruling of the Abuja Division of the Court of Appeal, which had stopped the execution of its judgment that quashed the terrorism charge preferred by the FG against him on October 28.
He contended that the appellate court committed a legal error when it heard and decided an application for a stay of execution of judgment in a criminal appeal brought under Order 6, Rule I of the Court of Appeal Rules, 2021, and Section 17 of the Court of Appeal Act of 2004, resulting in a miscarriage of justice.
Both the Court of Appeal Rules 2021 and the Court of Appeal Act, 2004, according to the IPOB leader, make no provision for a stay of execution of a Court of Appeal judgment in a criminal appeal delivered in a criminal appeal.
“Section 7 of the Court of Appeal Act, 2004, expressly provides for a stay of execution of the Court of Appeal’s judgment in civil appeals.”
“According to the Supreme Court’s decision in Olisa Metu vs Federal Republic of Nigeria & Anor (2017) IINWLR (PT. 1575) PP 157, an application for stay of proceedings/execution judgment of the court shall not be entertained or brought under the court’s inherent jurisdiction provided for in section 6(6)(b) of the 1999 Constitution” (as amended).
“The Court of Appeal’s jurisdiction can only be invoked if the relief sought is one that it is authorized to grant under an enabling law or statute.” There is no law or authority that allows the court below to grant a stay of execution in criminal appeals such as the one sought by the Respondent.
Kanu argued that “an application for stay of execution of judgment in a criminal appeal can only be entertained if the Applicant who sought to stay the execution of the judgment being appealed against has been convicted for an offence of murder or sentenced to death and is awaiting execution by the relevant authorities.”
Furthermore, he claimed that the appellate court failed to properly evaluate the evidence presented to it and thus reached the incorrect conclusion to suspend the execution of the order for his release from detention.
“A High Court of competent jurisdiction sitting in the Abia State, Umuahia Judicial Division, held that the Respondent’s agents set out as pythons to end the life of the Appellant, resulting in the Appellant’s inability to appear in court to stand his trial.”
“The certified true copy of the said judgment, which was attached to the counter affidavit as “Evidence of the Appellant’s rapidly deteriorating health condition, copiously deposed to in the Appellant’s counter affidavit, which was neither denied nor controverted by the Respondent, and which is an exceptional and compelling circumstance warranting the refusal of the Respondent’s application for stay, was not evaluated by the court below.”
“It is a court’s duty, in reaching a decision, to properly evaluate the totality of the evidence before it in order to make a just determination of the case.”
“In reaching its decision, the court below resorted to technicalities rather than doing substantial justice to the parties.” The ultimate goal of the law is to do substantive justice rather than technical justice.
“The Respondent failed to demonstrate any special or exceptional circumstance warranting the grant of the application for stay of execution,” Kanu added.
As a result, he petitioned the Supreme Court to vacate the order that stayed the execution of the Court of Appeal’s decision in his favor on October 13.
Kanu, who is currently in the custody of the Department of State Services, DSS, informed the Supreme Court that he would like to attend the appeal hearing.
