Nnamdi Okwu Kanu // ⓘ (born 25 September 1967)[5][6] is a British[7] political activist known for advocating for the secession and independence of Biafra from Nigeria.

[9] The main aim of IPOB is to restore the defunct Republic of Biafra which existed in Nigeria's Eastern Region during the Nigerian Civil War of 1967–1970.

[18][19] Kanu was born 25 September 1967 in Isiama Afara Ukwu, Umuahia — within the claimed territory of the Republic of Biafra a few months after it had declared independence from Nigeria.

Kanu was a relatively obscure figure until 2009 when he started Radio Biafra, a station that called for an independent state for the Igbo people and broadcast to Nigeria from London.

[11] On 5 September 2015, Nnamdi Kanu was a guest speaker at the World Igbo Congress which was held in Los Angeles, where he told his audience "we need guns and we need bullets".

[35] Kanu was finally arraigned on 23 November 2015 in an Abuja Magistrate Court for the first time[36][37] for charges of "criminal conspiracy, intimidation and membership of an illegal organisation" by Nigeria's Department of State Services (DSS).

More protests by IPOB members numbering over 15,000 grounded vehicular movements in the southeastern key economic city of Onitsha concurrently.

[40] Kanu, through his counsel, filed an application asking the federal authorities to transfer him from the custody of the Department of State Services (DSS) to prison.

[43] Idakwo further said the Department of State Services (DSS) had obtained an order from the Federal High Court, Abuja, dated 10 November, to detain the accused in its custody for 90 days.

Kanu disappeared from public view after his home was raided by the Nigerian military, in September 2017,[44] an event which led to the deaths of 28 IPOB members.

[15] In an interview in June 2017, Kanu demanded bullets and guns from a group of US-based Nigerians for self-defense against the incessant attacks on Igbos by the Fulani herdsmen which were currently reoccurring in Biafra lands.

In various air broadcasts, Nnamdi Kanu stated how his adoption of Martin Luther King Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi's forms of civil disobedience will lead to the "restoration of Biafra".

In an interview granted to Newsweek, Nnamdi Kanu opined his belief in the teachings of Martin Luther King Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi, "I hope that what we are looking for can be accomplished peacefully.

In December 2020, Kanu announced that IPOB had organized the Eastern Security Network (ESN) which was supposed to defend southeastern Nigerians from bandits and armed Fulani herders.

[54][52][15][16] IPOB and other Biafran separatist groups consequently began to mobilize and fight the security forces across several southern Nigerian states.

Despite this, Kanu maintained that IPOB was interested in a non-violent solution of the conflict and that ESN was supposed to fight bandits, not the Nigerian security forces.

[15][16] On 27 June 2021, Kanu was allegedly arrested in Kenya[17] or possibly another location[56][57] by Interpol and extradited to Nigeria where he is supposed to face trial.

On the occasion of his arraignment in court on 29 June 2021, Kanu told the presiding judge that the Nigerian military forced him to flee the country in 2017.

[61] On 19 January 2022, Justice Benson Anya of the Abia State High Court ruled that the 2017 arrest of Kanu was unlawful and an infringement on his human rights, and that his abduction and forceful return to Nigeria was "illegal" under local and international laws.