The leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra, Nnamdi Kanu, is undergoing hardship in the custody of the Department of State Services and has not changed his clothes since June, his lawyer, Ifeanyi Ejiofor, said on Wednesday.
Ejiofor also described as falsehood claims by the spokesman for the DSS, Peter Afunaya, that Kanu was not being maltreated in custody.
Ejiofor made the clarification in a statement titled, ‘Press statement in rebuttal of the wrong narrative being fed the public by the Department of State Services vide its spokesman’.
He said, “We find it very incomprehensible to believe that a supposedly responsible agency of the Federal Government such as the Department of State Service, notable for their indiscretion to court pronouncements, instead of taking steps to address the serious issues we are raising concerning the ill treatment being meted out to our client, deliberately issued a statement fully known to them to be total falsehood.
“If we may ask, what are they trying to achieve by deceiving the public? This and many other questions are begging for answers. Let Afunanya deal with these questions.
“Our position was to initially ignore the blatant falsehood deliberately dished out to the public by the DSS spokesman, Afunanya. But in view of the damage the intended result will achieve, it is now compelling that we set the records right.
“In his desperate effort to deny the obvious, Afunanya stated that our client is allowed the opportunity of daily changing of his clothes. This is a blatant falsehood!
Apart from his lawyers and persons who have visited him in custody, this fact can be verified from a highly respected Man of God, Bishop Sunday Onuoha, who can confirm that on the two occasions he visited Mazi Nnamdi Kanu at the DSS facility, he was putting on the same clothes. Our client has not changed his clothes since June 2021 that he has been in the DSS facility till date.
“The Fendi clothe he was putting on at the time he was abducted in Kenya is the only clothe he has worn to court and the general public can attest to this fact. This is despite our plea to the authorities concerned that his clothes should be changed.
“From Afunanya’s analysis, it is evident that he is not even familiar with the extant provisions of the Anti-Torture Act, 2017, a law every law enforcement official/personnel swore to protect.”
According to him, the legal team is unable to find in the statement where Afunanya clearly denied the fact that Kanu was not subjected to 23 hours of daily solitary confinement.
Ejiofor stated, “The fact that our client’s potassium level is depleted, which is a serious medical condition that the medical department of the DSS is struggling day and night to address, is beyond denial.
“Onyendu’s (Kanu’s) blood sample has been drawn for well over 21 times for laboratory examination but till date, no solution is in sight. Their trial and error has continued unabated.”
Copyright PUNCH.
