THE EVIDENCE NIGERIAN GOVERNMENT INTENDS TO USE AGAINST NNAMDI KANU
2 min read
By Emeka Ugwuonye
If you are familiar with criminal trials, it is clear that this man called Onye-Army is one of state witnesses against Nnamdi Kanu for the expected terrorist, treason, murder, etc charges. We have asked two sets of questions:
(1) How true is this confession, and
(2) How credible is it.
The first question is not really important in law or in criminal trial. The second question is what matters. That is: can a court of law accept this confession as meeting the procedural and substantive requirements of Nigeria’s Evidence Law? And will the defense lawyer be able to discredit this witness through cross-examination?
Judging from what we have seen so far, Ifeanyi Ejiofor, Esquire, Nnamdi Kanu’s lawyer, does not have what it takes to discredit this witness effectively during cross-examination. And if the testimony of this witness is accepted and not discredited, Nnamdi Kanu will be convicted of the following offenses:
(1) treason or treasonable felony,
(2) multiple murder and conspiracy to murder,
(3) terrorism, and sundry offences. And he will be sentenced for life. He won’t be able to come out alive without state pardon or commutation of sentence, likely to happen years into his sentence.
The goal here is to pragmatically assess what will happen, not to state our wishes and hopes as to what should happen. We are looking at hard realities of the law. We believe that there will be more witnesses like this man. We believe that their testimonies will be adequately collaborated by Nnamdi Kanu’s own statement. In other words, Nnamdi Kanu will be his own worst witness. He will convict himself.
