One of the lawyers representing the detained leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, has accused the Department of State Services (DSS) of engaging in “propaganda, concealment, and medical quackery” in its handling of Kanu’s worsening health condition.
In a statement issued on Thursday, Kanu’s lawyer, Barrister Onyedikachi Ifedi, expressed “utter dismay” over media reports, which he claimed were part of the DSS’s attempt “to misinform the public and malign our client.”
“The facts are simple and indisputable: the DSS has been playing hide-and-seek with Mazi Nnamdi Kanu’s health,” Ifedi said.
According to the lawyer, despite being present during medical examinations, the DSS allegedly imposed a doctor “with questionable credentials” on Kanu’s medical team.
He described one of the medical practitioners as “a quack doctor catapulted from obscurity” and “without the faintest clue of the grave dangers associated with potassium depletion in the bloodstream.”
Ifedi further questioned why the DSS refused to release Kanu’s full medical test results if, as it claims, there is nothing wrong with him.
“Why also did the DSS have to fly Mazi Kanu’s blood samples to South Africa for analysis if, as they falsely claim, nothing is wrong with him?” he asked.
He argued that the agency lacks the competence to manage life-threatening cardiovascular conditions such as aortic valve regurgitation and congestive heart failure.
“A security agency which does not even understand the clinical implications of these conditions has no business presuming to oversee the healthcare of a man whose life is already endangered by their reckless detention conditions,” he said.
The lawyer challenged the DSS to hold “an open press conference where independent journalists and medical experts can freely interrogate them on the state of Mazi Kanu’s health.”
He also alleged that the DSS has been intimidating doctors into altering their medical reports “to fit the government’s preferred narrative” and accused Abuja-based courts of bias.
“The tragedy of Nigeria’s judicial system is that these courts, steeped in bias against the Igbo, often oblige them without question,” he added.
Ifedi stressed that “the health and life of Mazi Nnamdi Kanu are not pawns in the DSS’s propaganda war” and vowed to continue exposing what he described as falsehoods before Nigerians and the international community.
