“The ball is in your court. Bring this man out.
“If we don’t want him in Nigeria, return him to Kenya or London where they took him from,” he added.
The monarch warned of growing restlessness among South-East youths, saying traditional rulers were losing credibility over the unresolved Kanu issue.
“Some of us here are being asked to go and work, but the young people in the South-East are so agitated they can even beat us.
He was first arrested in Lagos in October 2015 for treasonable felony over his separatist broadcasts on Radio Biafra. He was arraigned at the Federal High Court in Abuja and detained for over a year before Justice Binta Nyako granted him bail in April 2017 on health grounds.
Following a military raid on his Afaraukwu, Umuahia home during Operation Python Dance II in September 2017, Kanu fled the country. The court subsequently revoked his bail, and the Federal Government proscribed IPOB as a terrorist organisation.
In June 2021, the Federal Government announced his re-arrest and return to Nigeria from Kenya, a move his legal team described as an extraordinary rendition.
In October 2022, the Court of Appeal discharged him and ordered his release, ruling that the rendition invalidated the charges. However, the Supreme Court overturned that decision in December 2023 and directed that he stands trial at the Federal High Court.
On November 20, 2025, Justice James Omotosho found Kanu guilty on seven terrorism-related counts and sentenced him to life imprisonment, alongside concurrent prison terms on other counts. He was later transferred to the Sokoto Correctional Centre.
Meanwhile, the Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Prof. Muhammad Ali Pate, described the summit as the first comprehensive engagement with traditional and religious leaders since health sector reforms began over two years ago.
Goodwill messages were delivered by representatives of the World Health Organisation and the World Bank, as well as the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Health.
