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Nnamdi Kanu Requests Transfer From DSS Custody To Prison
- …Kanu’s legal team said he would not get a fair trial if he remained in DSS custody.
The leader of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, has applied to the Federal High Court in Abuja to be transferred from the custody of the State Security Service (SSS) to prison.
Complaining of a worsening heart condition, Kanu also prayed the court to make an order granting him access to his cardiologist.
In his application filed by his lawyer, Ifeanyi Ejiofor, on July 14, Kanu’s legal team said he would not get a fair trial if he remained in DSS custody.
“The applicant cannot get fair trial in this case if the applicant continues to be detained in the custody of the State Security Service, where there is apparent inhibition to witnesses and materials that will be used for his defence,” the application read in part.
Read also: Nnamdi Kanu: There Will Be No Trial Today – Lawyer
It added, “The principle of Nemo Judex in Causa sua is applicable in this case: The State Security Service is keeping and prosecuting the applicant at the same time.
“The fact that it was the State Security Service that arrested and accused the applicant for the commission of the alleged offences in charge number FHC/ABJ/CR/383/2015 and still keeps the applicant in their custody, clearly shows that the right to fair trial of the applicant cannot be guaranteed.”
The defence lawyer also argued that aside from the SSS not being “an impartial entity regarding the detention”, Kanu also faces the difficulties of having “very limited access to his lawyers”.
Ejiofor said Kanu’s lawyers can only visit him after the approval of the Director of the State Security Services has been first sought and obtained, adding that approval in most cases, takes days.
The situation, he said, “would greatly impede the defendant’s constitutional right to unrestricted access to facilities for the preparation of his defence”.
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