Police Detain Activist Sowore Inside Abuja Court in Show of Solidarity for Kanu

Armed officers from the police force have taken into custody the prominent rights campaigner and media owner Omoyele Sowore right on the grounds of a federal court in the nation’s capital, moments after he turned up to lend his voice to the cause of the jailed head of the outlawed Indigenous People of Biafra group.

The incident unfolded on Thursday in the heart of the Federal High Court building in Abuja, where Sowore had shown up to stand with Nnamdi Kanu, the detained leader of the pro-separatist outfit. Sowore has led the charge in recent weeks calling for Kanu’s outright freedom from custody, where he faces charges tied to rousing disorder and pushing for the breakaway of the south-eastern region.

Eyewitnesses described how the arrest came about as Sowore wrapped up his time in the courtroom. He pressed for his legal representative to tag along during the detention, even though no written summons had been shown. The officers bundled him into a patrol vehicle and whisked him off to the main police station in the Federal Capital Territory, where further questioning awaits.

When pressed on the grounds for the grab, one of the uniformed men simply replied that their superior, the area commissioner, had ordered them to bring Sowore in for a chat. The whole scene played out amid a tense air, with onlookers and fellow supporters voicing dismay at what they saw as a heavy-handed clampdown on free speech.

A well-known advocate for human liberties, Inibehe Effiong, wasted no time blasting the move on the social platform X, calling it a blatant insult to the rule of law. He slammed the officers and the sitting government for turning the courts into tools of suppression, demanding Sowore’s swift letting go and an end to what he termed underhanded tricks.

This latest snag ties back to a rowdy rally Sowore spearheaded in the capital just days earlier on 20 October, part of a wider wave of gatherings under the banner #FreeNnamdiKanuNow. Those events, which popped up across the south-east and beyond, sought to hammer home the plea for Kanu’s release. In the thick of the Abuja march, authorities rounded up a dozen participants, including Kanu’s own counsel Aloy Ejimakor, his sibling Emmanuel Kanu, and several others, before a local judge in Kuje ordered them held in the central prison.

The police laid out their case in a formal complaint to the magistrate, accusing the group of plotting unrest, stirring up crowds, and breaking the public calm in the face of a judicial ban on such unrest. The list of those pinched runs to grown-ups like Joshua Emmanuel, Bishop Wilson Anyalewechi, Okere Kingdom Nnamdi, Clinton Chimeneze, Gabriel Joshua, Isiaka Husseini, Onyekachi Ferdinand, Amadi Prince, Edison Ojisom, and Godwill Obiama. The court has pencilled in Friday for the first court appearance on these counts, which carry stiff penalties under rules against conspiracy, rousing trouble, and upsetting the peace.

Sowore’s detention marks yet another flashpoint in the heated push for Kanu’s liberty, a fight that has pulled in voices from across the political split and drawn sharp words from global watchdogs. Kanu himself has sat behind bars since his recapture in 2021 after skipping court years before, despite judges more than once ruling his case a sham and ordering his walk free. The government, though, dug in its heels, hauling him back to the dock on counts of terror and betrayal.