IPOB: Court grants Kanu access to medical care of his choice

• …orders the sessions be recorded

By Vivian Okejeme, Abuja

The leader of the proscribed  Indigenous People Of Biafra(IPOB) Nnamdi Kanu, can now have access to a medical doctor of his choice on grounds that he requires urgent ear surgery amidst his reported failing health.

Justice Binta Nyako of the Federal High Court, Abuja, Thursday, gave the ordered to the Department of State Service(DSS) as she granted all the relieves sought by Kanu.

The court also ordered that the DSS should also monitor, record and seal all medical sessions administered on the IPOB leader, for security purposes.

The judgement also dismissed the preliminary objections filed by the DSS challenging the application before it, on grounds that Kanu has the right to medical services even in detention.

The court in it’s judgment also ordered that all Kanu’s medical records be made available to the IPOB leader.

The detained IPOB leader is before the court seeking its order for an access to his doctors to conduct an independent examination to ascertain his actual state of health.

Kanu is praying the court for an order, granting him leave to, “apply for judicial review in the form of an order of Mandamus, compelling the Respondents to allow him unhindered access to his medical doctors to enable them conduct an independent examination of his present deteriorating health condition, as earlier ordered by the Federal High Court, Abuja, Justice Binta Nyako, on the 21st day of October, 2021; and as required by the express provisions of section 7 of the Anti-Torture Act, 2017”.

As well as, “an order of this Honourable Court granting leave to the Applicant to apply for judicial review in the form of an order of Mandamus, compelling the Respondents to avail the Applicant with all his medical records, from the 29th day of June, 2021, till date”.

Kanu listed some of the records he would require from the DSS, to include; his admission records, medical and clinical notes, nursing notes, observation charts and documentation during treatment or stay-in-hospital, laboratory test results, pharmaceutical records, radiological scans, images and reports, blood transfusion records, physiotherapy and rehabilitative treatment records, clinical findings, as well as diagnosis and treatment prescribed records.