Ex-envoy Onoh petitions FCT Chief Judge, IGP, others over Justice Ogbonnaya recognising Onyeama as Foreign Affairs Ministry
By Jeffrey Agbo
Ex-envoy, Ambassador Lilian Onoh, has petitioned the Chief Judge of the FCT over the ruling of Justice Keziah Ogbonnaya of the FCT High Court granting Geoffrey Onyeama legal status as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in her final judgment of their defamation case, delivered on 4 June 2025.
In the widely shared petition, which was copied to the IG of Police, American, British, Chinese, European Union and Swiss embassies as well as to the National Assembly, Onoh said that the ruling will make Nigeria “a global laughing stock for years to come” and stated that all diplomatic missions in Nigeria, the United Nations, President Bola Tinubu, CBN and National Assembly would also have to recognise Onyeama as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
She said that despite paying for the Certified True Copy (CTC) to appeal what she called “a blatantly irrational” judgment, Judge Ogbonnaya was withholding the CTC to stop her from appealing the judgment within the three-month window in order to enable Onyeama lodge criminal defamation complaint against her and have an arrest warrant issued by the police as part of his decades long vendetta after Onoh’s sister divorced him.
The ex-envoy then prayed the Chief Judge to refer Justice Ogbonnaya to the Police for prosecution because on January 11, 2024, Justice Ogbonnaya issued a widely reported death threat to her and the journalists in the court for reporting her alleged conduct and told them that “whoever writes what is not true against me will die”, which is a felony under Section 327 of the Nigerian Criminal Code Act, carrying up to 7 years’ imprisonment.
Onoh said that nobody sanctioned the judge after the widely reported death threat, including the police. She said she hoped Embassies would impose a travel ban on the judge if Nigerian authorities fail to take action against her.
She criticised the judge for allegedly refusing to hear the motion challenging Onyeama’s competency to sue as “the Ministry of Foreign Affairs” before proceeding with the trial in violation of standard legal principles, stating that she would absolutely not join the judge and Onyeama “in their naked dance in the market square” by acknowledging Onyeama as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Even though the judge had not granted Onyeama any monetary damages, she had allegedly ordered Onoh to apologise to him in two national newspapers for the statement: “The Ministry of Foreign Affairs is only trying to continue its corrupt practices which have brought Nigeria into great disrepute”. Onoh said that to do so would be to abdicate her own “very correct senses”, which she absolutely would not do.
Onoh asked the Chief Judge to suspend the ruling by Ogbonnaya and conduct an investigation into alleged abuse of process and bias by the judge, including Justice Ogbonnaya’s refusal to hear several pre-trial motions before proceeding with the trial and granting Onyeama recognition as the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and also granting him “a gender reassignment” from male to neuter without a medical certificate.
Onyeama had sued Onoh for writing reports of his alleged corruption to former President Muhammadu Buhari which Onyeama alleged were defamatory. Justice Ogbonnaya delivered her judgement on 4 June 2025, over a year after adoption of Final Written Addresses instead of within the mandatory three months.
