The trial of Biafran self-acclaimed Prime Minister, Simon Ekpa, for alleged terrorism has started in Finland.
Ekpa is accused of participating in a terrorist organisation, alongside publicly inciting crimes for terrorist purposes.
It would be recalled that the Finnish police investigated the case together with the Nigerian authorities.
Ekpa appeared at the Päijät-Häme District Court as seen in a video on Friday.
According to prosecutors, he has been actively involved in a separatist movement seeking independence for southeastern Nigeria under the name “Biafra.”
They allege that the activity, conducted online and coordinated from Finland, may constitute terrorism under Finnish law.
Prosecutors are demanding a six-year prison sentence for Ekpa.
“We have a great deal of evidence regarding this individual’s online activity and communications,” said state prosecutor Sampsa Hakala.
At the pre-trial hearing, Ekpa’s lawyer, Kaarle Gummerus, raised concerns about the reliability of information coming from Nigeria.
Earlier, SaharaReporters reported that Finland’s national prosecution authority charged Nigerian Biafran agitator, Simon Ekpa, with inciting terrorism online
The Prosecution authority, in a statement accused Ekpa, who is also a Finnish citizen, of “public incitement to commit crimes with terrorist intent and participation in the activities of a terrorist group,” according to AFP.
The prosecutors said that Ekpa, a self-acclaimed Prime Minister of the Biafra Republic Government in Exile, committed the offence in Lahti, a city in southern Finland, between 2021 and 2024.
AFP reports that while Finnish authorities did not name the individual in the official statement, a Finnish public broadcaster, YLE, confirmed the suspect as Ekpa—a dual Finnish-Nigerian national who has drawn international attention for his outspoken campaign to establish an independent Biafra state in southeastern Nigeria.
Ekpa was arrested and detained by Finnish police in November 2024.
According to the Prosecution Authority, he has remained in custody and denied all charges.
The prosecution alleges that Ekpa’s online activities incited acts of violence in Nigeria under the guise of pro-Biafra agitation.
The charges stem from his prominent role in a faction of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), a separatist group proscribed as a terrorist organisation in 2017 by the former President Muhammadu Buhari-led Nigerian government.
IPOB has long pushed for the secession of the Igbo-dominated southeastern region of Nigeria, which was the centre of a brutal civil war from 1967 to 1970, resulting in over a million deaths.
Finnish authorities have also investigated potential financial support for Ekpa’s activities.
Following his arrest in 2024, police requested the detention of four individuals suspected of financing his operations.
However, the Prosecution authority confirmed that the charges against those individuals had been dropped due to insufficient evidence.
Ekpa has also been a source of controversy for spreading misinformation online.
The case has drawn widespread attention both in Finland and internationally, particularly in Nigeria, where Ekpa is a polarising figure — hailed by some as a freedom fighter and condemned by others as a provocateur fueling unrest
