Samuel Ogbemudia is dead

The former military governor of Mid-Western Region and old Bendel State, Brigadier General Samuel Osaigbovo Ogbemudia is dead.

The pre-eminent Edo politician and statesman died in the early hours of Friday.

Confirming his transition, a member of his family who spoke to ionigeria.com on the basis of anonymity said that Dr. Ogbemudia has been sick for many months and has been in and out of hospital.

Dr. Samuel Osaigbovo Ogbemudia was born in Benin City on 17 September 1932. He was military Governor (1967–1975) of the Mid-West State, later renamed Bendel State, part of which in turn became Edo State.

As a youth he lived with his elder cousin, Mr. FS Uwaifo, a Benin-based businessman. He attended Benin Baptist School (1941–1945), and then the government school, Victoria, in the Cameroons (1945–1947). His secondary education was at the Western Boy’s High School, Benin City (1947–1949).

He joined the Nigeria army in 1957, training at Teshie, Ghana and at Netheravon and Salisbury Plain in England (1957). He attended the officer cadet school at Aldershot, England in 1960, and was commissioned second lieutenant in 1961. He attended the United States army special welfare school at Fort Bragg, South Carolina in 1962. Ogbemudia served with the United Nations peacekeeping force in the Congo for 16 months, and served in Tanzania in 1964. He was appointed as an instructor to the Nigerian Military School, Zaria in 1964