The Federal High Court in Abuja has shifted the hearing of the suit filed by the Nigeria Police Force against Omoyele Sowore and other conveners of the #FreeNnamdiKanuNow protest to November 5.
The case, which was scheduled for Wednesday, could not proceed due to the absence of the presiding judge, Justice Mohammed Umar, who was said to be sitting at the Enugu Division of the court.
The matter, listed as number 11 on the cause list, was consequently adjourned for hearing of the motion on notice.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that Justice Umar had, on October 17, fixed October 20 for the respondents in the police’s ex-parte motion to show cause why the interim order made by the court against the protesters should be vacated.
However, the October 20 sitting was stalled due to the protest which held on the same day, disrupting activities at the Federal High Court in Abuja.
Earlier, the judge had granted an interim order sought by the police restraining Sowore and others from protesting for the release of Nnamdi Kanu in certain sensitive areas within the Federal Capital Territory.
Justice Umar specifically barred the protesters from demonstrating around the Aso Rock Villa, National Assembly, Force Headquarters, Court of Appeal, Eagle Square, and Shehu Shagari Way pending the hearing of the motion on notice.
He also made an order abridging the time “within which the respondents will respond to the application on notice to cause the ex-parte order be set aside on Monday, the 20th of October, 2025 at 9.00am,” before adjourning until October 20 for hearing.
The order followed an ex-parte motion filed by police counsel, Wisdom Madaki, on behalf of the Federal Republic of Nigeria on October 17.
The police, in the motion marked FHC/ABJ/CS/2202/2025, listed Sowore, Sahara Reporters Limited, and Sahara Reporters’ Media Foundation as the 1st to 3rd respondents.
Also joined in the suit were Take It Back Movement (TIB), “for the Transformation of Nigeria or any form of organisation or any other person(s) acting either expressly or impliedly under such instruction or with like intention,” as well as unknown persons, listed as 4th and 5th respondents.
In an affidavit supporting the motion, deposed to by a police officer, Bassey Ibithan of the Directorate of Legal Services, Force Headquarters, Abuja, the deponent claimed that the planned protest could threaten national security if not restrained.
Sowore, publisher of Sahara Reporters and presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC) in the 2019 and 2023 elections, had planned to organize the protest demanding the release of Nnamdi Kanu, detained leader of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB).
He had described the planned October 20 protest as a peaceful demonstration against Kanu’s continued detention.
