The Nigerian ambassador to Morocco, Alhaji Mansur Nuhu Bamalli, has been confirmed dead.

Until his passing, Bamalli was also the Magajin Garin Zazzau and biological younger brother to the Emir of Zazzau.

A statement by the Media and Publicity officer of the Zazzau emirate council said Mansur Nuhu Bamalli died at a private Hospital in Lagos while on transit to Morocco.

The statement added that “funeral prayers will be announced later.”

He is survived by a wife and 2 children. Ex-President Muhammadu Buhari had appointed the deceased a year ago.

In a letter dated October 7 and signed by the then Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama, he had said the appointment was in recognition of the decades of your meritorious service to our fatherland in the Nigerian Foreign Service.

“You shall be invited in due course for the ceremony of investiture. Please, accept my warm felicitations and those of the Honourable Minister of State, the Permanent Secretary and the entire staff of the Ministry,” the letter read.

Before his appointment he was a deputy director at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Foreign Affairs Ministry had issued a notice for the recall of Nigeria’s ambassadors, both career and non-career envoys across 300 foreign missions worldwide, but the diplomats are yet to return to the country owing to logistics, including Authority to incur Expenditures (AIEs) for passages.

AIEs are the details of the entitlement of each envoy in terms of their passages and other travel arrangements to return to Nigeria.