A former Chief of Defence Staff (CDS) Admiral Ibrahim Ogohi (rtd), is dead.
Family sources said he had been clinically ill due to old aged related sickness for weeks before he died in his Abuja home in the early hours of Sunday.
The Director, Defence Information, Brigadier General Tukur Gusau, in a terse statement on Sunday, confirmed the news of Ogohi’s death, saying the former CDS died in the early hours of Sunday, June 30, 2024 in Abuja.
“With deep sorrow, I announced the death of Admiral Ibrahim Ogohi (rtd), a former Chief of Defence Staff (1999-2003). He passed on in Abuja in the early hours of today,” adding that more details will be communicated later.
Admiral Ogohi, who hailed hailed from Okura, Lafia in Dekina Local Government Area of Kogi State was appointed Nigeria’s Chief of Defence Staff from 1999 to 2003 by the then President Olusegun Obasanjo.
He joined the Nigeria Defence Academy (NDA) in 1968 and received training in India, the UK, France, and the US.
Ogohi’s career began in the role of watchkeeping duties on the Nigeria Navy Ship (NNS) Enugu before becoming a gunnery and navigation officer in Ibadan from 1972 to 1973.
He became a laboratory officer of the naval armament depot Kirikiri in 1976 and an executive officer at NNS Akaso, Port Harcourt, from 1977 to 1978;
Ogohi became the commanding officer at NNS Eken in France in 1982 and was named the commanding officer of the NDA’s naval wing from 1986 to 1987.
He was then promoted as the NDA’s director administrator. He was also appointed chief of plans of the naval headquarters and flag officer commanding the western naval command.
Ogohi was the first naval officer to reach a four-star rank in the Nigerian military and the first chief of defence staff from the navy.
He will be buried later in the day after a prayer session at the national mosque in the federal capital territory (FCT).
