As the controversy over the conviction of Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) leader Mazi Nnamdi Kanu continues, human rights lawyer Barrister Christopher Chidera has declared the judgment a “legal nullity built on repealed and non-existent laws.”
Speaking with journalists in Abuja on Monday, Chidera argued that the court lacked jurisdiction to convict Kanu and called for his immediate and unconditional release.
“The Constitution is not a suggestion — it is the supreme law. Nigeria cannot claim to be a constitutional democracy while its courts attempt to convict a citizen under laws that do not exist,” Chidera said. “This is not advocacy. This is not an interpretation. This is not politics. This is the plain truth of the law.”
Chidera explained that Counts 1 to 6 of Kanu’s charges were based on the Terrorism Prevention (Amendment) Act 2013, a statute that has since been repealed and is no longer part of Nigeria’s criminal law.
He cited Section 36(12) of the Constitution, which states that a person cannot be convicted of an offence unless it is defined in a written law in force at the time, adding, “A repealed law is not a ‘written law in force.’ A conviction under a repealed law is void. There is no exception.”
He also challenged Count 7, noting that it relied on the so-called “Criminal Code Act Cap C45,” which he described as a “legal ghost” and non-existent statute.
According to Chidera, the Supreme Court had previously ruled that Count 7 was defective and ordered it corrected, but neither the prosecution nor the trial court complied.
“A court cannot invent jurisdiction over an offence that does not exist in any statute. A judge cannot rewrite Nigeria’s laws from the bench,” he said.
Chidera accused the court of defying the Supreme Court’s directive and of refusing to take judicial notice of the repeal of the terrorism law, despite Section 122 of the Evidence Act requiring mandatory acknowledgment.
“A judge who refuses to acknowledge the very existence of the laws he swore to uphold has abandoned the judicial oath he took under the Seventh Schedule of the Constitution,” he said.
He warned that any post-trial attempt to amend charges, change the situs of the offence, or interpret the charges retroactively would amount to “fraud, not law.”
He further criticised what he called “judgment-day confusion,” saying Count 7 was later tied to the Customs and Excise Management Act (CEMA), which had already expired under its five-year limitation period and had been misapplied, adding, “This is not jurisprudence. This is confusion multiplied by illegality.”
Chidera said the court lacked jurisdiction in four independent ways: reliance on a repealed law, reliance on a non-existent statute, disobedience to the Supreme Court, and refusal to take mandatory judicial notice.
“In law, when jurisdiction collapses, everything else collapses with it. Nothing stands,” he said. He demanded that Kanu be released immediately and unconditionally, stating,
“To convict a citizen under laws that do not exist is not merely a miscarriage of justice – it is the death of legality. Nigeria is better than this. Our Constitution demands better than this. And history will remember who stood for the law, and who stood against it,” the lawyer said.
