No doubt, it is more than seven years since she left the Senate after a stint of serving the Adamawa Southern Senatorial zone comprising eight local governments of Adamawa State as their senator. She served for a four-year-term. The people of the senatorial zone are now yearning for the return of the distinguished former Senator Grace Folashade Bent, to the Senate to serve them again in 2019.
The people of the zone are making a clarion call on her to vie for the position of senator in order to rescue them from the shackles of deprivation, underdevelopment and want.
Senator Grace Folashade Bent served the constituency very well by pursuing people oriented policies and programmes. She is the only senator in the history of the state that had a large heart to accommodate the diversity of people in the senatorial zone, irrespective of tribe and religion. Senator Grace Bent, is the only politician that sought the mandate of the people and did what was beneficial to the people of her constituency. It is on record that Senator Bent positively touched the lives of the people of the constituency through various programmes. Till date, the people are still enjoying the dividends of democracy that brought into the constituency.
During her four-year stewardship as the senator representing the Adamawa Southern Senatorial Zone, she constructed a good number of roads, thereby brought succour to the people, which enabled them transport their farm produce to the urban markets and also opened the area to other viable economic activities.
Again, during her stewardship as the Senator representing the zone, she constructed health clinics and fully equipped them in the senatorial zone, she also provided motorized bore-holes in all the constituency for the people to have access to potable drinking water.
She has tremendous respect for the people especially the common men and women of the Southern Senatorial Zone and imbibe the norms and culture of the various tribes that abound in the eight local government areas that make up the constituency. It is because of this that the people are still yearning for her to represent the constituency in the Red Chamber of the National Assembly in 2019.
Senator Grace Folashade Bent has opened a new vista in representation because of her populist programmes that directly touched the lives of the people. During her stewardship as the senator representing the Adamawa Southern Zone, she inculcated in the people the desire and passion to always demand that their representative brings the dividend of democracy to the constituency. The senator knows the political rope very well when it comes to the issue of proper representation, given her track record of having served the people meritoriously in the past. The people gave her the mandate and she did not fail or let them down. She never wavered in her attempt to deliver the basic necessities of life to the people during her tenure as the senator representing the Adamawa Southern Senatorial zone.
The people are very proud of her sterling qualities. She provided the people with fertilizer to increase the yield from their farms. And in the process left an enduring legacy of selfless service and good representation. It is based on these facts that the people in the Adamawa Southern Senatorial Zone are now demonstrating their support by making this call on the woman of substance and political sagacity to once contest in 2019 as a senatorial candidate, so that she can represent the zone in the Red Chamber of the National Assembly. The people have not forgotten what she did for them and they want a repeat of the good works.
►Usman Sarturaki, wrote from Jambutu, Juweta-Yola, Adamawa State.