A South-East traditional ruler on Tuesday urged President Bola Tinubu to either free the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) leader Nnamdi Kanu or deport him to Kenya, warning that his continued detention is fuelling youth unrest in the region.
Eze Ogbunechendo of Ezema Olo Kingdom, Dr Lawrence Agubuzu, made the bold plea directly to Tinubu at the 2026 National Traditional and Religious Leaders Summit on Health, held at the State House Conference Centre, Abuja.
“Bring this man out. If we don’t want him in Nigeria, return him to Kenya or London where they took him from.
“Please do something about this. We cannot make progress in this country if we don’t tell ourselves the truth,” Agubuzu told Tinubu.
Themed “The Role of Traditional and Religious Leaders in Advancing the Nigeria Health Sector Renewal Investment Initiative,” the summit aimed to rally community leaders for health reforms, culminating in a compact signing to boost healthcare delivery.
But Agubuzu used his goodwill message to confront Kanu’s fate. “I must tell you, Mr President, that personally I don’t feel very happy because you were not here in the morning when the Ooni of Ife gave the opening remarks and was gingering us to work as one,” he said, referencing the Ooni’s unity call.
He then accused the Ooni of hypocrisy, claiming the monarch plans to honour Yoruba Nation agitator Sunday Igboho, Kanu’s South-West counterpart. “This same Imperial Majesty is arranging to confer a very high honour on Sunday Igboho, who in my own part of Nigeria and the South-East, we see him as a counterpart of Nnamdi Kanu,” Agubuzu charged.
“The ball stops on your court. Bring this man out. If we don’t want him in Nigeria, return him to Kenya or London where they took him from,” he insisted.
Agubuzu highlighted the fury of South-East youths, saying traditional rulers risk being branded sell-outs. “Some of us here are being asked to go and work, but the young people in the South-East are so agitated they can even beat us.
“They see us as sell-outs. We come to Abuja; they may think we come to collect money and then we keep quiet,” he warned.
Kanu, 58, the British-Nigerian IPOB founder, whose organisation has been proscribed as a terrorist group, faces life imprisonment after Justice James Omotosho’s 20 November 2025 conviction on seven terrorism counts.
His 2015 treason arrest, 2017 bail jump, 2021 rendition from Kenya, and ongoing appeals—from his discharge by the Court of Appeal to the subsequent reversal by the Supreme Court—have polarised Nigeria. He is now in Sokoto Correctional Centre, appealing without private counsel.
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