The date: September 14, 2017.

The medium: social media, no thanks to the smartphone.

Since then, the leader of the Indigenous People Of Biafra (IPOB) has gone AWOL.

A bomb in the house

Speaking into a video recorded on the terrace of his dad’s compound in Afaraukwu, Umuahia, Kanu begged his supporters to flee the premises because the army had left a bomb in there somewhere.

“Leave that house…leave the house”, Kanu blared. “It appears they (the soldiers) might come back. They just blew off everything. Everywhere attack.

“It appears there’s a bomb in the house. And they took my father away. That’s what I know for sure”, Kanu stuttered, his voice now increasingly shaky and laced with trepidation.

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Moments after that video was shot and sent to the rest of the world…moments after it was reported that soldiers laid a siege on Kanu’s country home, ransacked the rooms and barricaded the place, no one quite knows what has become of the pro-Biafra agitator and self-acclaimed spiritual leader of the Biafra 'nation'.

72 hours after the army declared IPOB a terrorist organisation with the Southeast Governors banning the activities of Kanu’s group in Igboland, no one knows where Kanu has disappeared into.

'Army killing us'

“Army are killing us in Umuahia, the home town of our leader Mazi Nnamdi Kanu”, alleged Emma Powerful, who is the Media and Publicity Secretary of IPOB.

“They came to kill our leader and to display their arms in the street leading to Mazi Nnamdi Kanu’s house, shooting sporadically which led to killing of five people and leaving many wounded.

“Their intention was to kill Mazi Kanu and to put the Biafrans in fear, but they misfired  by thinking that if they kill him, they will silence us. But we are not afraid, we will continue our non-violent agitation for Biafra until we actualize our dreams”.

However, as questions continue to surround Kanu’s whereabouts, one group says it knows exactly where Kanu has fled to.

Cameroon border

The Arewa Youth Consultative Forum (AYCF) says not only has Kanu gone into hiding, he is carrying on with his plans to flee Nigeria through the Cameroonian border.

“We are aware that he is scheming to find a way of escape through Cameroonian borders, which is easier for him to move and run back to where he belongs.”

AYCF says Kanu is "on his way looking for how to run to Cameroon and that we are aware from our intelligence reports.”

Kanu is due back in court next month to face charges bordering on treasonable felony and illegal possession of firearms.

The IPOB leader has flouted all his bail conditions which includes not addressing a rally and refraining from granting interviews.

The State has to produce Kanu in court in the capital city of Abuja, for the continuation of his trial.

Has law enforcement kept Kanu somewhere safe, away from the madness in Abia in the last couple of days, in order to keep him fresh for his next court hearing date?

Calls placed to Abayomi Shogunle and Colonel Sani Usman, an Assistant Commissioner of Police and spokesperson for the army respectively on Kanu’s possible whereabouts, were not returned.

However, various sources on the ground in Abia State, say Kanu has since fled his dad’s compound—a view corroborated by Sam Hart, Senior Special Assistant to the Abia State Governor on Public Communications.

On the run

“Nnamdi Kanu is the chief magnet of his people here. All of his people here have dispersed….Kanu himself has dispersed”, said Hart.

Pressed on if he knew where Kanu has fled to, Hart gave very little away.

“You want to put me on the spot”, he said with a laugh. “Of course I don’t know where Kanu has gone to. Am I the custodian of Nnamdi Kanu? The best I can give to you is that he’s not in his father’s house.

“Kanu has always been in his father’s house…in his father’s palace. His father is the King of their community. So, he has always lived inside his father’s palace.

"As we speak…remember that on Thursday night, the military invaded the palace, desecrated the whole place, scattered vehicles there and did all kinds of things that shouldn’t be spoken about, but the truth is that there’s no Nnamdi Kanu…every member of his family, his dad, Kanu…they are all on the run.

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“And now that IPOB has been declared a terrorist organisation, I guess they are not going to show their faces any time soon. That automatically means that his boys have also disappeared. The fear of reprisals, the fear of confrontation with the military has been grossly diminished”.

Hart also said that calm is gradually making a return to Abia following the tension and skirmishes of the past few days.

Nnamdi Kanu was arrested on October 14, 2015 in a Lagos hotel room as soon as he set foot in the land of his birth from a sojourn abroad.

Before his arrest, Kanu ran a pirate, hate radio station from the UK.

He was kept in jail for more than a year before getting charged to court for treason and an attempt to illicitly balkanize Nigeria and pursue self determination, through the back door.