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SAMUEL Ogbemudia, a retired brigadier general and the two-term governor of the defunct Bendel State, is dead. He was 84 years old. Ogbemudia as governor of the old defunct Bendel State, raised the benchmark of governance and laid the infrastructure for development in Edo and Delta states.

The former military governor died was said to have died in a private hospital in Lagos on Thursday, March 9, night at about 11.00 p.m.

Ogbemudia had a very successful military career that was translated into his appointment as military governor of the defunct Midwestern State at the beginning of the civil war.

The legacy he built in governance attracted the defunct National Party of Nigeria, NPN, to lure him into politics in 1982 upon which he emerged as the party’s candidate for the 1983 governorship election. He won the election and served for three months before the Muhammadu Buhari led coup truncated the Second Republic. Among his legacies were the University of Benin, which he established at the beginning of the 1970s and which honoured him with a doctorate degree.

He was until his death a chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.

— Mar 10, 2017 @ 15:30 GMT

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