The Iru Ekun Controversy, the 2027 Elections and the Dangerous Politics of Unequal Treatment.
An Oblong Media Global Intelligence Commentary
There comes a point when contrasting government actions cease to look like isolated decisions and begin to raise a much larger question about the character of the state itself.
Nigeria may have reached that point.
The contrasting trajectories of Nnamdi Kanu and Sunday Adeyemo, popularly known as Sunday Igboho, have become impossible to ignore.
Both emerged as prominent advocates of ethnic self determination. Both challenged the Nigerian federation. Both attracted the attention of federal security agencies. Both eventually found themselves outside Nigeria while being pursued by the Nigerian state.
Yet today their circumstances could hardly be more different.
Nnamdi Kanu is serving a life sentence. Sunday Igboho is free and is associated with the establishment and expansion of a regional security organisation in the South West.
Steve Osuji’s recent article, “2027 National Elections: A Very Troubling Matter Arising,” adds an even more disturbing dimension to this contradiction.
It raises allegations about the size, purpose and possible political implications of Igboho’s Iru Ekun Security Network as Nigeria approaches the 2027 elections.
Some of those allegations remain unverified and should not be repeated as established fact. But what has already been publicly reported is sufficiently significant to demand answers from the Nigerian government.
The fundamental question is therefore unavoidable:
How does the Nigerian state justify the extraordinarily coercive treatment of Nnamdi Kanu and IPOB while another prominent separatist advocate is today able to organise a regional security network with significant establishment support?
There may be legal differences between the two cases.
But those differences must now be explained convincingly.
THE DEVELOPMENT THAT CHANGES THE CONVERSATION
In August 2026, the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Enitan Ogunwusi, publicly pledged ₦100 million, payable in instalments, and a Toyota Hilux vehicle in support of the Iru Ekun Security Network associated with Sunday Igboho.
This was not merely social media speculation. The development was reported by several Nigerian newspapers.
On 26 August, Igboho inaugurated the Ogun State chapter of Iru Ekun. At that event, he reportedly discussed training, identification cards, uniforms, allowances and deployment arrangements for members.
More significantly, he reportedly stated that the Federal Government would determine who trained members while state authorities would determine their deployment.
These developments demand scrutiny.
What exactly is Iru Ekun?
What legislation established it?
Who regulates it?
Who commands its personnel?
Who determines recruitment?
Who finances it?
What weapons, if any, may its members possess?
What powers of arrest, detention, search or use of force do they have?
And what exactly is the relationship between this organisation and federal or state security institutions?
These are not anti Yoruba questions.
They are constitutional questions that should be asked of any organisation exercising security functions anywhere in Nigeria.
THE CLAIM OF A 100,000 STRONG FORCE
Steve Osuji alleges that Iru Ekun could comprise between 80,000 and 100,000 personnel.
If established as fact, that would represent an extraordinary development in Nigeria’s internal security architecture.
A force approaching 100,000 people would no longer resemble an ordinary neighbourhood vigilante organisation.
But caution is necessary.
Public reporting presently confirms the organisation’s existence, expansion and significant backing. It does not, on the evidence available to us, independently establish that 80,000–100,000 trained personnel have already been recruited, much less that they constitute an armed private army.
That distinction matters.
We must not replace one form of propaganda with another.
But the uncertainty itself gives the Federal Government an obligation to clarify the matter.
How many people belong to Iru Ekun?
Are they armed?
Who is training them?
Who is paying them?
Under whose command will they operate?
And, crucially as Nigeria approaches 2027:
What role, if any, will they be permitted to play during elections?
NNAMDI KANU: THE CONTRADICTION THAT CANNOT BE ERASED
Nnamdi Kanu’s story followed an extraordinarily different trajectory.
On 20 November 2025, the Federal High Court convicted him on seven terrorism related charges and sentenced him to life imprisonment.
The prosecution relied upon allegations including incitement and activities connected with violence and coercive sit at home enforcement.
Those allegations are serious.
It would therefore be intellectually dishonest to reduce Kanu’s entire prosecution to the claim that he was imprisoned simply for asking for Biafra.
But neither can the Nigerian government be permitted to begin the history of this conflict at its most violent chapter.
What happened before the radicalisation matters.
And it matters enormously.
FROM AGITATION TO RADICALISATION: DID THE STATE HELP CREATE THE MONSTER IT LATER FOUGHT?
IPOB did not begin as an army.
Its early mobilisation was overwhelmingly political: broadcasts, rallies, marches, demonstrations and demands for a referendum on Biafra.
One may agree or disagree vehemently with those objectives. But political agitation and armed insurrection are not synonymous.
The Buhari administration nevertheless adopted an increasingly coercive approach.
The Nigerian Army conducted successive Operation Python Dance, Egwu Eke, exercises in the South East, beginning in 2016.
Then came the particularly controversial bloody and brutal second exercise in 2017.
Soldiers moved into the vicinity of Kanu’s family residence at Afara Ukwu, Umuahia, amid violent confrontation and allegations of deaths and human rights violations.
Amnesty International had already documented allegations of excessive and lethal force against pro Biafra demonstrators, including people it described as peaceful protesters.
Then came proscription.
In September 2017, a Federal High Court order proscribed IPOB and designated its activities terrorism related.
Another full fledged, even more bloodier and brutal iteration of Operation Python Dance followed.
The message transmitted to a generation of young South Easterners was unmistakable:
The Nigerian state had chosen war and coercion over political engagement.
And this is where Nigeria must confront an uncomfortable question.
Did the state help radicalise some of the very young people it subsequently had to fight?
That is not an attempt to excuse terrorism.
It is an attempt to understand how political conflicts mutate.
States can radicalise movements by the manner in which they respond to them.
When young people become convinced that peaceful demonstrations produce bullets, arrests, military deployments and proscription rather than dialogue, moderates can lose influence while extremists gain it.
That phenomenon is hardly unique to Nigeria.
This does not excuse the subsequent murder of security personnel.
It does not excuse attacks upon police stations or government institutions.
It does not justify the killing of civilians.
And it certainly does not legitimise the violent enforcement of sit at home directives, but it does provide context. No smoke without fire.
Anyone responsible for premeditated murder or terrorism should answer individually for those crimes.
But Nigeria must not rewrite the chronology.
The violence that eventually consumed parts of the South East did not materialise from thin air. It was obviously incited and instigated by a federal government controlled by an individual with military mentality.
It emerged against a background of political alienation, unresolved historical grievances, insecurity, confrontations with security forces and an escalating cycle of action and reaction.
The federal government therefore has a responsibility to examine its own role in that escalation.
OPERATION PYTHON DANCE VERSUS IRU EKUN
And now the comparison becomes deeply uncomfortable.
With IPOB, the Nigerian state deployed soldiers.
It conducted repeated Operation Python Dance exercises.
It proscribed the organisation.
It pursued its leader.
Kanu fled Nigeria following the military operation around his home.
He was subsequently apprehended in Kenya and forcibly returned to Nigeria in 2021 under circumstances that generated major international legal controversy.
A Kenyan court subsequently found that his abduction and forcible transfer violated his rights.
Today he is serving a life sentence.
Now consider Sunday Igboho.
Here is another man who openly championed ethnic self determination and advocated a Yoruba nation.
He too confronted the Nigerian state.
His Ibadan residence was raided by security forces.
He too fled Nigeria.
He too was arrested abroad.
Yet the subsequent trajectory could hardly be more different.
Igboho regained his freedom.
He returned to Nigeria.
And today a security organisation associated with him is being publicly established and expanded with the support of influential Yoruba institutions.
One separatist leader ended up in prison.
Another separatist leader is associated with organising a regional security structure.
That does not automatically prove ethnic discrimination.
But pretending that the contrast is insignificant insults the intelligence of Nigerians.
WHAT PRECISELY IS THE STANDARD?
This is the question Abuja must answer.
If organising young people around ethnic self determination constituted such an existential threat in the South East that soldiers, proscription and terrorism legislation became necessary, what precise legal principle governs the organisation of thousands of youths into a regional security network by another prominent self determination advocate?
The answer cannot simply be:
Kanu and Igboho are different.
Of course they are.
Their organisations are different.
Their conduct is different.
The evidence against them is different.
Their respective legal histories are different.
But that does not resolve the underlying issue.
What Nigerians need to know is whether the threshold for determining when ethnic mobilisation becomes a national security threat changes according to the region in which it occurs.
That is the issue.
IS THE SOUTH-WEST RECEIVING POLITICAL ACCOMMODATION DENIED TO THE SOUTH EAST?
There is an important difference between proving ethnic discrimination and identifying circumstances that reasonably create the perception of it.
There is presently insufficient evidence to assert as fact that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu created Iru Ekun, controls it or intends to deploy it for the APC during the 2027 elections.
Those are extremely serious allegations and require evidence.
But the perception problem is already substantial.
Nigeria is approaching a consequential national election.
The country has a history of electoral violence, political thuggery and voter intimidation.
Any rapidly expanding regional security organisation associated with a prominent political and ethnic activist therefore deserves scrutiny.
Would Iru Ekun personnel be permitted anywhere near polling units?
Could they participate in election security?
Who would prevent individual members from being recruited by politicians?
What happens if an opposition presidential candidate campaigns in an area where such an organisation operates?
What rules govern their interaction with the Nigeria Police Force?
These questions must be answered before January 2027, not after something goes wrong.
THE OONI’S INTERVENTION AND ANOTHER UNCOMFORTABLE COMPARISON
Perhaps one of the most revealing aspects of this entire episode is the willingness of influential South West traditional institutions to engage Sunday Igboho.
The Ooni of Ife has publicly supported the security initiative associated with him.
Whatever one’s opinion of that decision, it demonstrates something important:
The South West establishment understands the value of protecting, engaging and reintegrating its controversial political actors.
Which leads inevitably to another question.
Where is the equivalent collective South East intervention for Nnamdi Kanu?
Where are the governors?
Where are the senators?
Where are the political grandees?
Where are the traditional institutions?
Where is the sustained, coordinated strategy for resolving perhaps the single most consequential political security question confronting the region?
South East politicians frequently boast about their closeness to Abuja.
Some celebrate access to the Presidency almost as an achievement in itself.
But access without results is merely photography.
Political influence must ultimately be measured by what it delivers for the people you represent.
If extraordinary access to federal power cannot even produce sustained political dialogue around the Kanu question, then South East political leadership must also examine itself.
This is not a demand that politicians overturn a court judgment.
It is a demand for leadership, dialogue, constitutional advocacy and political courage.
THE DANGER OF PRIVATISING SECURITY
There is another issue larger than either Kanu or Igboho.
Nigeria cannot continue multiplying armed or quasi armed security structures without clearly defining their constitutional position.
The country already has the Armed Forces, Nigeria Police Force, Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, state supported security organisations, forest guards and numerous vigilante formations.
Community security organisations can be useful.
Indeed, conventional policing has failed many Nigerian communities so badly that local participation has become unavoidable.
But community protection must operate under law.
Recruitment must be regulated.
Training must be standardised.
Weapons must be controlled.
Command structures must be transparent.
Accountability must be enforceable.
A private organisation cannot simply acquire police or military powers because its founders are popular or its objectives enjoy local sympathy.
And traditional endorsement cannot substitute for statutory authority.
If Iru Ekun is a legitimate community security organisation, government should have absolutely nothing to fear from publishing its legal framework.
THE 2027 ELECTIONS: THIS MUST BE CLARIFIED NOW
Steve Osuji’s gravest allegation is that Iru Ekun could eventually become an instrument of electoral intimidation.
That has not been established as fact.
But neither should the possibility simply be dismissed.
The Presidency, National Assembly, INEC and security agencies should establish publicly:
Who controls Iru Ekun?
How many personnel does it actually have?
Where does its financing come from?
What training is being provided?
What equipment is being issued?
Whether members may carry firearms.
What relationship exists between it and government agencies.
And whether its personnel will have any role whatsoever during the 2027 elections.
Transparency would either substantiate legitimate concerns or destroy unfounded rumours.
Silence will achieve neither.
THE LESSON NIGERIA REFUSES TO LEARN
The tragedy is that Nigeria repeatedly attempts to solve political problems as security problems.
And then appears surprised when political grievances mutate into security crises.
Military force can suppress demonstrations.
It can arrest leaders.
It can disperse crowds.
It can proscribe organisations.
But an army cannot shoot an idea.
If the grievance survives, it merely changes form.
The lesson from the South East should therefore be studied carefully.
Had the Nigerian government engaged more seriously with the political grievances underlying the early Biafran agitation; had peaceful advocacy been separated more deliberately from criminal activity; had individual offenders been prosecuted without creating the perception that an entire political movement and perhaps an entire region were under siege, might subsequent events have unfolded differently?
Nobody can know with certainty.
But Nigeria must at least possess the intellectual courage to ask the question.
Did we defeat extremism, or did aspects of our response help manufacture it?
That question is not an absolution of IPOB.
It is an indictment of bad statecraft.
CONCLUSION: TWO RESPONSES, ONE FEDERATION
This argument is ultimately much bigger than Nnamdi Kanu and Sunday Igboho.
It concerns the behaviour of the Nigerian state.
Nobody should demand that Sunday Igboho be imprisoned simply because Nnamdi Kanu is imprisoned.
That would merely reproduce injustice in the opposite direction.
Neither should anyone demand immunity for crimes committed in the name of Biafra.
The demand is simpler: one federation, one Constitution, one standard of justice.
If reconciliation is legitimate statecraft in the South-West, reconciliation cannot suddenly become weakness when dealing with the South East.
If dialogue with influential Yoruba institutions is sensible, dialogue with South East institutions cannot become appeasement.
If community self protection is legitimate in Yorubaland because citizens feel inadequately protected by conventional security agencies, the same insecurity experienced elsewhere must receive equal recognition.
And if the Federal Government believes that Nnamdi Kanu’s conduct warrants life imprisonment while Sunday Igboho’s present activities warrant accommodation, then government owes Nigerians a clear explanation grounded in law, evidence and consistent public policy.
Justice cannot have an ethnic address.
National security cannot have different definitions depending upon geography.
And Nigerian citizenship cannot confer different tolerances, protections and opportunities for reconciliation according to proximity to political power.
The emergence of Iru Ekun therefore presents President Tinubu with both a problem and an opportunity.
His government can explain its legal status transparently.
It can guarantee that no regional security organisation will become an instrument of partisan coercion in 2027.
It can ensure that the same constitutional standards apply throughout the federation.
And it can finally confront the Nnamdi Kanu question not merely as a criminal prosecution but as part of a deeper political wound requiring statesmanship.
Because another uncomfortable truth must enter Nigeria’s historical record:
The radicalisation that subsequently devastated parts of the South East did not occur in a vacuum.
It arose amid genuine grievances, political alienation, insecurity and an increasingly violent confrontation between separatist activists and the Nigerian state.
That does not absolve anyone who subsequently committed murder, terrorism or other crimes.
But condemning those crimes does not absolve the state from examining whether excessive force helped transform political anger into something considerably more dangerous.
A wise federation engages grievances before they become insurgencies.
A careless federation suppresses grievances, helps radicalise some of those carrying them, and then spends years, and countless lives, fighting the consequences.
Nigeria must decide which federation it intends to be.
Because perhaps the greatest threat to Nigeria’s unity is not the existence of people demanding self determination.
It is the belief among millions of Nigerians that the country in which they are being asked to remain does not treat them equally.
Until Nigeria destroys that perception through its actions rather than its slogans, agitation will continue to return in different names, different generations and different parts of the federation.
Justice must be seen to belong equally to Kano and Imo, Lagos and Enugu, Sokoto and Ibadan. Otherwise, “One Nigeria” risks becoming not a covenant of equal citizenship, but merely a slogan demanded from those who increasingly question whether the federation treats them as equals.
By Hon. Chimazuru Nnadi-Oforgu
E pluribus unum, Out of many, one.
Oblong Media Global Intelligence
Independent Political Analysis
13 October 2026
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