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Claim
The Facebook page of the. Nigerian Daily Times published a claim that a Finnish court has approved the extradition of Simon Ekpa to Nigeria.
Verdict
This claim is UNPROVEN as there’s no concrete evidence anywhere to back up the claim.
Full Text
The Facebook page of the Nigerian Daily Times has published a story stating that the Finnish court has approved the extradition of Simon Ekpa to Nigeria.
Daily Times claimed that Finnish authorities have approved the extradition of Simon Ekpa, the controversial Finnish-Nigerian separatist agitator, to Nigeria. The transfer is scheduled for July 15, 2025, following the ruling of the Päijät-Häme District Court in Lahti on April 18, 2025.
There have been mixed comments to the post by the Nigerian Daily Times. It has also generated hundreds of reactions from Facebook users
Also, an X user made the claim here.
Background
Born 21 March 1985, Mr Ekpa hails from Ngbo, a community in Ohaukwu Local Government Area of Ebonyi State, south-east Nigeria.
The Biafra agitator, who is based in Finland, has been linked to growing insecurity in southeast Nigeria.
He has continued to issue sit-at-home orders in the region during which residents who step out are sometimes killed or attacked by gunmen enforcing the illegal order.
Mr Ekpa has been using his social media pages, mainly X, to push a secessionist agenda, issue illegal orders, disseminate fake news, and solicit funds for suspected terrorist activities.
In November 2024, Ekpa, a self-proclaimed leader of the proscribed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), was arrested by law enforcement in Finland.
He was subsequently sent to prison by the district court of Päijät-Häme for “spreading terrorist propaganda on social media”.
Last year, Mikko Laaksonen, the senior detective superintendent at the National Bureau of Investigation (NBI) in Finland, disclosed that a Finnish district court fixed May 2025 for the prosecution to file charges against Ekpa.
Verification
First, no reputable news organization in Nigeria or Finland has confirmed this to be true at the time of filling this check.
In a report by BBC pidginn recently, Ekpa was formerly represented by lawyer Ilkka Kopra, who confirmed that the Finnish court decided to detain him.
However, Kopra has since retired, and Ekpa is now represented by a new attorney, Kaarle Gummerus.
Gummerus confirmed receipt of the pre-trial case file and stated that the trial is scheduled for June, as reported by BBC pidgin.
“We reached out to Simon Ekpa’s new lawyer, Kaarle Gummerus, to find out the current status of the case and when Ekpa will be taken to court for trial.
The lawyer confirmed that he has received the pre-trial file of the case and they will go through it to decide what to do next.
“However, when we asked him when Simon Ekpa will appear in court, he said the case will go to court in June 2025,” BBC pidgin reported.
Another proof is that this claim lacks critical details about the Finnish court’s approval for the Ekpa’s extradition.
Issues with the extradition
Nigeria and Finland do not have a specific bilateral extradition treaty. Extradition, the formal process by which one state surrenders an individual to another state for prosecution or punishment of a crime, is often governed by such agreements.
Finland, like many civil law countries, places a strong emphasis on the existence of a treaty to ensure legal certainty and reciprocity in extradition matters.
Simon Ekpa’s Finnish citizenship presents another significant hurdle. International law generally recognizes the principle of non-extradition of nationals. Many countries, including Finland, have constitutional or statutory provisions that prohibit or severely restrict the extradition of their citizens. This principle is rooted in the idea that a state has a primary responsibility to protect its citizens and that it should be subject to its justice system.
While some exceptions exist, often related to very serious international crimes or when the citizen is also a national of the requesting state (which is not the case here), these exceptions are usually narrowly defined and subject to strict legal scrutiny. Finland’s commitment to protecting the rights of its citizens makes the extradition of one of its nationals a highly sensitive issue requiring compelling legal grounds.
February 2023, when Nigeria’s former Ministry of Foreign Affairs summoned the Finnish Ambassador to Nigeria, Leena Pylvanainen, over threat by Mr. Ekpa to disrupt the country’s 2023 general elections, Mrs Pylvanainen said that although the Finnish government was concerned about the situation, Mr Ekpa’s rights, as a Finnish citizen, needed to be considered.
“So, everything has to be done according to Finnish legislation,” she stated.
Conclusion
With no other credible publication corroborating this story and the lack of details in it, this claim remains UNPROVEN.
Credit: FactWatch Nigeria
