Justice Binta Nyako of the Federal High Court Abuja has said the Isi Agu clothe (a traditional attire worn mainly by people of the Southeast of Nigeria) can not be worn in her court.
Nyako said this on Wednesday during the trial of Nnamdi Kanu who is standing trial for alleged terrorism offences before her court.
The Director of Legal, DSS told the court that family members of Kanu brought a cloth with a lion’s heart, which “offends the standard operating procedures of the service.
The DSS was responding to the court’s question on why Kanu still wore his white Fendi designer cloth to cloth.
Ozekhome had complained that despite the court’s order, the DSS had refused Kanu to change cloths.
However, Justice Nyako asked the defendant; “Mr Kanu, what type of cloth do you want to wear”?
“I want to wear the clothes of my people, ‘Isi Agu'”, Kanu replied.
Responding swiftly, the judge said ‘that kind of cloth cannot be worn in my court’.
Nyako, however, fixed April 8, for ruling on the preliminary objection filed by the detained leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, Mazi Nnamdi Kanu, challenging the validity of the 15-count amended charge preferred against him by the Federal Government.
Nyako fixed the date after Chief Mike Ozekhome SAN, counsel for Kanu as well as Shuaibu Labaran, the prosecution counsel, had adopted arguments for and against the defendant’s preliminary objection.
In a short adumbration, Ozekhome pleaded with the court to acquit his client and dismiss all the charges filed against Kanu by the Federal Government.
Ozekhome argued that the 15-count amended charge was ‘defective and baseless’.
Specifically, Ozekhome informed the court that his application seeks the ‘quashing, striking out and dismissing of the 15-count amended charge’ against Kanu for being ‘incompetent and denying the court of jurisdiction’ to entertain charge.
The application, with 34 grounds, and supported by 36-paragraph affidavit, Ozekhome said, also seeks for an order acquitting and discharging Kanu for want of jurisdiction and for being defective, baseless and incompetent.
“We wish to state emphatically and particularly in paragraphs 7, 8, 9, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29 and 30 of the affidavit in support of the motion as going into the substance of the case yet to be heard”, Labaran had said.
