Chapter 37: Questions for the State (The Rule of Law)

Timeframe: 2025
Location: Abuja, Washington D.C., Geneva
Key Actors: IPOB legal team, Nigerian Attorney General’s office, African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights

Epigraph:

“If the Supreme Court endorses Ker-Frisbie, does Nigeria officially recognize kidnapping as state policy?”
— Citizen’s Dossier, Question 21 [1]

The Narrative Opening

The Camera Lens

In December 2025, IPOB lawyers released a 20-question dossier addressed to the Nigerian State. It read like a charge sheet: Where is the flight manifest? Who authorized torture? Where are the alleged 2,000 heads? Each question highlighted a hole in the prosecution’s narrative. The government never issued a point-by-point reply.

Section 1: The Citizen’s Dossier — Questions 1–20

These are not rhetorical flourishes; they are evidentiary gaps demanding answers:

1. Where is the flight manifest for the Gulfstream jet that left JKIA with a hooded detainee in June 2021, and who authorized its departure?
2. Why did the Federal Government ignore or fail to appeal the Kenya High Court judgment that awarded damages for the illegal abduction?
3. If Kanu was a fugitive, why was no formal extradition request filed in a Kenyan court under the Commonwealth Extradition Act?
4. On what legal basis does the Attorney General continue to ignore UN Working Group Opinion No. 25/2022 ordering Kanu’s immediate release?
5. Did the court registry receive an affidavit from his lawyers in Israel offering to return if security was guaranteed, and if so why was it ignored?
6. Under what law can the government obtain a stay of execution against a criminal discharge, thereby keeping a discharged citizen in custody?
7. Can the prosecution tender a single ballistic or forensic report tying a recovered firearm to Kanu’s operational control?
8. Were the Radio Biafra broadcasts used as evidence forensically authenticated to rule out manipulation?
9. If Kanu warned about the Kuje jailbreak, why was his intelligence used as proof of guilt rather than as a cue to secure the facility?
10. Who actually ordered Ahmed Gulak’s murder, and why were the alleged suspects summarily executed instead of tried?
11. Can the DSS show any bank transfer from IPOB-controlled accounts to a known arms dealer or manufacturer?
12. Is there an intercepted communication where Kanu orders a specific ESN attack on a specific police station?
13. Has the government investigated credible allegations that state-backed vigilantes carried out false-flag attacks later blamed on IPOB?
14. Who has arrested the criminals enforcing sit-at-home orders after Kanu’s letters cancelling them?
15. What precisely did the British High Commission do during the ten days he was held incommunicado in Kenya?
16. Has the court admitted the medical report detailing the torture-induced heart complications, or is it being suppressed?
17. If the Supreme Court concedes the rendition was illegal, how can the trial—the fruit of that illegality—remain constitutional?
18. Did Operation Python Dance troops possess any search warrant before invading the Afaraukwu palace?
19. Where is the official casualty log of civilians killed during anti-IPOB operations, and why are there no autopsies?
20. What is the Federal Government’s plan for security in the South East if Kanu spends life in detention—does the agitation evaporate or metastasize?

Section 2: How to use the checklist

Journalists, legislators, and civil-society groups now carry this list to every briefing. Some have turned it into a tear-out flier titled The Citizen’s Dossier. The instruction at the bottom is simple: “Tick the box when the Government answers.” Months later, every box remains unchecked.

The “Investigative Evidence” Box

Exhibit AK: Citizen’s Dossier (Dec 2025)

• Released via press conference in Abuja.
  
• Logged by the African Commission as annexure in Petition No. 780/2025.

The Verdict

By formalizing unanswered questions, the dossier turns silence into evidence. Every omission is a spotlight on the rule-of-law gaps that now haunt the case.

Chapter Endnotes / Citations

• [1] IPOB Legal Team. (2025, Dec 5). Citizen’s Dossier: 20 Questions for the Nigerian State.