By Trendsetter Tribune 
From abroad, Nigeria looks increasingly lawless as President Tinubu’s government, the judiciary, and the Nigeria Bar Association enable the illegal conviction of IPOB leader Nnamdi Kanu under a repealed law.
From a foreign perspective, Nigeria is rapidly becoming a textbook case of a state where law is subverted by political power. Barrister Christopher Chidera, a member of the Mazi Nnamdi Kanu Defence Consortium, has blasted the Tinubu-led government, the judiciary, and even Nigeria’s premier legal body, the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA), for blatant lawlessness.
According to Chidera, the government prosecuted and convicted Nnamdi Kanu, leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), under the Terrorism Prevention (Amendment) Act, 2013 (TPAA)—a law that was repealed in 2022. The law was replaced with the updated Terrorism Prevention and Prohibition Act (TPPA), yet the courts allegedly ignored the new legislation and jailed Kanu under a “dead” law.
“The trial judge pretended a dead law was alive. That is illegal. NBA, NJC, and reasonable legal minds know this, but they stay silent,” Chidera said.
From the US or international vantage point, this is not just a legal technicality—it is evidence of a broken system where the government, courts, and lawyers work together to trample basic legal rights. The case reveals how Nigerian authorities bend the law to silence political opponents, with the NBA and National Judicial Council (NJC) apparently complicit through their silence.
Chidera warned that allowing the conviction to stand sets a dangerous precedent:
“Any judge can resurrect any old law. Parliament becomes useless. The Constitution becomes decoration. Today it is Kanu. Tomorrow it can be anyone. This is lawlessness disguised as justice.”
Observers outside Nigeria would recognize this as a government weaponizing the courts, using legal loopholes and judicial complicity to consolidate power. The NBA, which should be defending the rule of law, instead seems to have chosen silence over principle, raising questions about the independence and integrity of Nigeria’s legal elite.
For international audiences, the story is a clear warning sign: Nigeria’s legal system is being co-opted by political power, and the protections citizens should have under law are increasingly meaningless. The Kanu case is emblematic of a government willing to ignore its own laws to achieve political goals, a pattern that undermines trust in the country’s institutions and raises alarms for anyone monitoring governance in Africa.
“This is not just about Nnamdi Kanu. This is about law versus lawlessness. Courts in Nigeria are issuing fraud in a robe. If Nigerians accept this, no one is safe,” Chidera concluded.
For US-based readers, this highlights a troubling trend in foreign governance where the rule of law is sidelined for political expediency, underscoring the importance of watching how legal institutions operate in fragile democracies.