Abdul Mahmud
Attorney-General’s press conference on Nnamdi Kanu’s arrest raises more questions than answers. A few folks are pointing fingers at the UK government. For those who know how cumbersome extradition procedures are, something outside law happened
I’ll try and break it down here.
If MNK was actually extradited from the UK, he must have undergone the fastest extradition process in the UK. Bear in mind the processes which involved Augusto Pinochet and presently Julian Assange. Extradition is driven by the cooperative law: UK Extradition Act, 2003 and the bilateral mutual assistance treaty on extradition ( Nigeria and UK).
Because extradition law is a cooperative law, a country must make request for the extradition of someone and the other country to which request is made is obliged by law to act. If an extradition request for MNK was made by Nigeria to the UK Home Secretary, the procedures guaranteed for countries under “category b” of the UK Act has to be followed.
Here’s a summary:
1) On receipt of request, the Home Secretary makes a decision on arrest and passes that decision to the District or High Court, which must issue the warrant of arrest of the fugitive. The Home Secretary cannot order arrest. The procedure for issue of warrant allows for legal representation for the fugitive. The court can decline to issue warrant.
2. Once the court declines or grants warrant, the Home Secretary turns the request for extradition to the High Court. Then, the extradition proceedings begin.
Where the court finds that there is legal basis for extradition, it turns its decision to the Home Secretary eho makes an order for the extradition of the fugitive.
The fugitive then has 14 or 21 days ( I’m not certain now) to appeal the order before the High Court. If successful, order of Home Secretary will be quashed. Where it fails, there is fugitive’s right of appeal as far as the UK Supreme Court. It is a long and winding justice for the fugitive and the requesting state party. For clarity, read: R v Bow St Metropolitan Stipendiary Magistrate (2000). This authority has a set of 3 constitutional law decisions of the House of Lords on extradition.
That said, and with all of this in mind, is it probable that MNK was ever arrested in the UK and made to go through the UK extradition process?. The legal bar of death penalty in the UK Extradition Act makes it difficult for a requesting state party like Nigeria to successfully secure extradition for offences with the death penalty. Therefore, my sense is that MNK was either snatched outside the UK (perhaps in a neighbouring African country like Cameroon that Nigeria recently allowed to snatch dissidents in Abuja) or MNK returned for his trial, based on a deal with the government.
Though, my concluding assertion may be speculative; but anything is possible in Nigeria. After all, the circumstances of MNK’s escape a few years still raise questions than answers.
