A chieftain of the Labour Party, Kenneth Okonkwo, has called for the release of the detained leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu while comparing his alleged crime to that of Yoruba separatist, Sunday Igboho.

Okonkwo made these statements in an interview on Arise TV on Wednesday, July 3, claiming that Kanu's detention was motivated by ethnic bias.

Recall that Kanu has been in the custody of the Department of State Services, DSS, since he was arrested and extradited from Kenya in June 2021.

He is currently facing terrorism charges filed against him at the federal high court.

According to Okonkwo, Kanu is been held in detention due to “ethnic bias,” adding that he has not committed worse crimes like other separatists whose cases in court have been dropped.

“Nnamdi Kanu has not done anything that other people from other zones have done.

“We know about Sunday Igboho of the Yoruba nation agitator. We know of the Boko Haram people who say that they want a different country where Western education is an abomination.

“These people have been released, not just that they have been released; in the case of Boko Haram, they have been reassimilated into society and given plum jobs.

“Why is Nnamdi Kanu’s case different? There is an ethnic and some unnecessary bias that is keeping that man in jail.

“The government should be wise enough to release this man. You can release him conditionally or unconditionally.

“As a lawyer, I have watched the legal issues very clearly, and I saw that even in the courts, from the high court to the supreme court, there are discordant tunes amongst them.

“Even in the issue of bail, some of the tiers of the court have granted him bail. Even in the issue of the charges, some tiers of the court have quashed all the charges.

“So, you can see that the government has a lot of places it can stand to release the young man and bring peace to the South-East.

“He is now more like a political prisoner. The longer Nnamdi Kanu is in prison, the taller he becomes and the shorter the government becomes,” he said.

Meanwhile, 50 members of the House of Representatives have asked President Bola Tinubu to order the release of Kanu.

On Tuesday, governors under the umbrella of the South-East Governors’ Forum also resolved to meet with Tinubu to seek the release of the separatist leader.