Nigeria Releasing Pop Idol From Jail

Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, a popular singer who has been a political sore point for successive Nigerian regimes, is being released from prison immediately, the military government said Wednesday.

A statement also said that Judge Gregory Okoro-Idogo, who headed a 1984 military tribunal that sentenced Fela to five years’ imprisonment on a currency offense, is being retired.

A report in a Nigerian magazine, Newswatch, said the judge visited Fela in prison last year and apologized for the sentence, saying he was pressured by military authorities to send him to jail.

Fela, 47, has had a long history of clashes with authorities, who were stung by his biting political and social criticism or embarrassed by his calls for pan-Africanism.