Outlawed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) has threatened to confront security operatives if the federal government failed to produce its leader, Nnamdi Kanu, dead or alive, on Tuesday, in court.

The IPOB leader has not been seen since the Nigerian Army allegedly invaded his home in September. Kanu, who was arrested in Lagos on 14 October, 2015, for alleged treasonable felony, among others, was released in April, 2017, after Justice Binta Nyako of the Federal High Court, Abuja, had granted him bail.

He was ordered to return to court to face his trial on 17 October.

And IPOB, in a statement by its spokesperson, Emma Powerful, said: “The barefaced lies of the Nigerian Defence Minister, General Mansur Dan Ali, and that of the Buhari regime against our leader and organisation is beginning to unravel before the eyes of the world.

“By admitting publicly that soldiers were sent to Isiama Afaraukwu to look for our leader without any order or warrant from a court of law confirms the contempt in which the Nigerian government holds the rule of law and their judicial process.

“It is therefore incumbent upon civilised nations of the world and organisations alike to ask the APC-led Nigerian government why they decided to send armed soldiers to invade Kanu’s residence.”

It further said: “One outcome is guaranteed in all this, should Nigeria not produce our leader in court on the 17th of October 2017, there will be inevitable confrontation on a scale the human mind cannot imagine, at a time and place of our choosing.”