Ex-Delta Speaker Dies In Hospital Toilet

A former Speaker of the Delta State House of Assembly, Mr
Young Igbrude, is dead.

The Tide gathered that the death occurred at St. Luke’s
Hospital, Asaba, where the man took one of his sons for medical treatment.

Aged 62, the late Igbrude was said to have personally driven
his car to the hospital.

A source at the hospital said that while the deceased was
waiting for the son to be attended to, he went to one of the public
conveniences to ease himself.

“After treating the son, we started looking for the father
and when we couldn’t find him around, we decided to check the public
conveniences.

“And to everyone’s shock, we found him lying inside one of
the conveniences and a close observation showed that he fell down inside the
place.”

The source hinted that Igbrude’s death might have resulted
from cardiac arrest.

No medical officer in the hospital was around to confirm
cause of the death when our correspondent visited.

But Chief Gabriel Awodeha, former Chief Press Secretary to
the late Speaker, said the corpse had been deposited in the hospital’s morgue.

At the residence of the Igbrudes on Ovuozourie Macaulay
Street, Government Reservation Area, sympathisers were trooping to the premises
at about 6 p.m.

His wife, Mimi and children were in a state of shock and
could not speak to anyone even as top government officials and close friends of
the family gathered around them.

Pointing to a Nissan Premeira car, marked SLK 163 AA, parked
in the compound, his gateman said: “This was the car oga drove when he was
going out with the son at about 11 O’clock, this morning. Oga was not sick at
all”.

Among sympathisers who visited the home of the deceased were
Mrs Hanatu Ochei, the wife of the current Speaker of Delta House of Assembly;
Mrs Betty Efekhoda, the Commissioner for Women Affairs and Social Development;
as well as the Chairman of the Local Government Service Commission, Chief Nkem
Okwuofu.

The late Igbrude, was an indigene of Owheologbo in Isoko
North Local Government Area of the state.

He got elected the Speaker of the House of Assembly on June
3, 2003 but he was impeached on May 25, 2006.