{"id":5844,"date":"2017-11-14T18:31:25","date_gmt":"2017-11-14T18:31:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=5844"},"modified":"2017-11-14T18:31:25","modified_gmt":"2017-11-14T18:31:25","slug":"ipob-court-fixes-january-17-whether-or-not-to-rescind-proscription","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=5844","title":{"rendered":"IPOB: Court fixes January 17 whether or not to rescind proscription"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>By <strong>Yemi Oyeyemi<\/strong>, Abuja.<br \/>\nThe Acting Chief Judge of the Federal High Court Justice Abdul Kafarati Tuesday fixed\u00a0January 17, 2018\u00a0to deliver judgment in the application filed by the proscribed Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB), seeking to vacate its order of proscription.<br \/>\nJustice Kafarati fixed the judgment date after counsel to the federal government and Solicitor-General of the Federation Mr. Dayo Apata and\u00a0counsel to IPOB, Mr. Ifeanyi Ejiofor, adopted their briefs of arguments for and against\u00a0 the proscription order issued on September 20, 2017.<br \/>\nMoving the application, Ejiofor urged the court to vacate the Order of Proscription of IPOB as a terrorist organization on the ground that the process followed in obtaining it was defective.<br \/>\nHe said that the Terrorist Act is explicit and specific on who can give\u00a0approval for an organization to be proscribed.<br \/>\nHe said that President Muhammadu Buhari who the Act specifically empowered to approve the proscription order did not give his approval as required by the law.<br \/>\nHe said that neither a letter written by the Attorney General of the Federation to the President did not amount to approval; nor the letter signed by\u00a0the Chief of Staff to the President, Abba Kyari, conveying approval could not suffice, adding that the  duty of the President under the act could not be delegated.<br \/>\nThe order of the court did not comply with the processes of\u00a0Section 40 of the Terrorist Act which defined the office of the President and all actions that are to be taken by him under the act. He said in the instant case, no approval was given by the\u00a0President\u00a0.<br \/>\nHe also argued that IPOB has never engaged in any terrorist activities adding that procession and rallies which the organization engaged in were not terrorist acts.<br \/>\nEjiofor said that IPOB was registered in England,\u00a0India, and several other countries and that her members have the right for self determination under the United Nations Chapter.<br \/>\nThe counsel denied claims by the Solicitor-General that IPOB was linked with the importation of arms into the country\u00a0 by a Turkey national.<br \/>\nApata opposed the application, according to him, in the interest of justice, public peace, constitutional order, territorial integrity and national security.<br \/>\nHe said that the application should be refused because IPOB engaged terrorist\u00a0activities.<br \/>\nThe Solicitor General presented 11 exhibits depicting instances where the activities of IPOB have been classified by security agencies as terrorist acts, including the killing of a policeman.<br \/>\nHe submitted that Nnamdi Kanu the leader of the proscribed IPOB has called Nigeria a zoo that must be scattered.\u00a0 He said that a less, but similar incident fueled the\u00a0Rwandan genocide.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Yemi Oyeyemi, Abuja. The Acting Chief Judge of the Federal High Court Justice Abdul Kafarati Tuesday fixed\u00a0January 17, 2018\u00a0to deliver judgment in the application filed by the proscribed Indigenous Peoples of Biafra (IPOB), seeking to vacate its order of proscription. Justice Kafarati fixed the judgment date after counsel to the federal government and Solicitor-General [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":5846,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5844","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5844","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=5844"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5844\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=5844"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=5844"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=5844"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}