Former Governor Chukwuemeka Ezeife of old Anambra is one of the high-profile Igbo political figures attending the trial of IPOB Nnamdi Kanu at the Abuja Division of the Federal High Court.

Mr Ezeife said he was in court to represent the Ndigbo (the people of Igbo extraction worldwide).

On June 29, the court ordered the IPOB leader to be remanded in SSS custody pending the hearing and determination of the case.

The court also granted the request that the matter get an accelerated hearing to guard against delay in justice and fixed today for trial continuation.

Mr Kanu, rearrested on July 27 in Kenya, was accused of jumping bail in 2017. He appeared before the court on June 29.

To secure his release, Enyinnaya Abaribe (PDP–Abia), Tochukwu Uchendu, and a Jewish high priest, Emmanu El- Salom Oka BenMadu, on April 28, 2016, signed an undertaking to ensure his attendance in court.

Following Kanu’s disappearance after he was released on bail, the court, on November 14, 2018, ordered the three sureties to forfeit the N100 million bail bond they each consented to.

All the sureties had since approached the Court of Appeal in Abuja to challenge the ruling.

Mr Kanu’s lawyer, Ifeanyi Ejiofor, had protested the revocation of his client’s bail, even as the court rejected his request for time to file affidavit evidence to explain why he jumped bail.

Mr Ejiofor insisted that Mr Kanu’s refusal to appear in court was occasioned by the unwarranted fatal invasion of his home at Afaraukwu in Abia by the Nigerian Army.

This claim Mr Kanu restated when he appeared in court immediately after his rearrest.

(NAN)