Judge who ordered Diezani’s arrest is dead

Valentine Ashi, a judge of the federal capital territory high court in Abuja, is dead.

The judge was said to have died at a hospital in Abuja on Thursday. He reportedly suffered a liver ailment.

According to a court official, the judge’s family informed the court about his death on Friday.

Called to bar in 1987, Ashi served a lecturer at the Nigerian Law School, Abuja campus, in 2001 until he was appointed a judge in FCT on July 15, 2010.

The Cross River-born judge had made the headlines in December 2018 when he ordered the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), the Department of State Services (DSS) and other security agencies to arrest Diezani Alison-Madueke, former minister of petroleum resources, within 72 hours.

He issued a warrant for Madueke’s arrest to enable the EFCC apprehend and arraign her for alleged financial crimes in Nigeria.

In 2014, Ashi had also barred former President Olusegun Obasanjo from publishing his autobiography, My Watch.

In 2016, the judge sacked Ali Modu Sheriff , former governor of Borno state, as acting chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), describing the process that led to his emergence as illegal.