Just in: Maikanti Baru,Ex-NNPC GMD, is dead

The immediate-past managing director of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, Maikanti Baru, is dead.

The current GMD of the corporation, Mele Kyari, confirmed the death on his verified Twitter handle, saying he died last night.

“My brother, my friend and my mentor, Dr Maikanti Kachalla Baru, immediate past GMD of NNPC died late last night. He was of exemplary character and disposition. May Allah forgive him and have mercy upon him,” he tweeted.

A reliable family source also told this newspaper that he died around 1am on Saturday at an Abuja hospital after a brief illness.

Born in July 1959 in Misau, Bauchi State, Baru attended Federal Government College, Jos, for his secondary education where he graduated in 1978.

In 1982, he obtained his bachelor of engineering degree from Ahmadu Bello University, Zaria.

Baru has a doctorate in Computer Aided Engineering from the University of Sussex in the United Kingdom.

He was appointed NNPC GMD by President Muhammadu Buhari in July 2016, a position he held until 2019 before he was replaced with Kyari.