GOV. MAMMAN BELLO ALI: DEATH OF AN ACHIEVER

I was dumpfounded, when browsing through the dailies penultimate week on the internet, when my eyes catches...Breaking News of the The Nation newspaper with a big caption" Yobe State Governor Mamman Bello Ali dead".

While, it is really the wish of allah to take away his servant at the right time and moment he wants.

Any mortal would at the end of the day, taste the bitter pill of death whether he likes it or not. Infact, the very day, that one was born the stipulated days allocated to him to live on this earth starts counting. Late Gov.Mamman Bello Ali time is up in far away Miami Florida in the United States of America and there is no any miracle to be done by anybody to rise him up-this is purely the work of Allah, who gives life to anything on this earth.

Late Gov. Mamman Bello Ali is just like a senior brother to-though I am not related to him by blood but having to know him when they lived in Clerk Quarters today known as Gwadabawa ward, Jimeta of Yola-North Local Government of Adamawa State when their father, who is still kicking resides in one of the Government houses just near our house.

Late Gov. Mamman Bello Ali's childhood life was in Jimeta where he was born and bred before the quest for further took him away to Kaduna Polytechnic. On his graduation from the Polytechnic, the urge to work for his state the then Borno State Government made him to secure employment in Maiduguri where he was employed as an Engineer in the state Ministry of Works.

I recalled with nostalgic how late Gov. Mamman Ali use to send me on errand with his bossom friend late Mu'azu Inuwa Attah. Infact, it is really worth mentioning that late Gov. Mamman continue his relationship with the Attah's family by being one of the friends of Alhaji Mouktar Garba Ibrahim.

It is on record, that late Gov. Mamman while serving as a Senator whenever he was in Jimeta, the only place one would meet him apart from his father's house along Bauchi street was in Alhaji Mouktar's house behind the famous Bata Shop.

The last time, I sat my eyes on him was in 2005, when he come down to Jimeta over the death of one of his younger sibling and I went to his father's house to condoled him. He receive me warmly with Shekarau Yerima a former staff of the Hausa Service of Deutche-Welle now with Radio Gotel in Yola.

He appreciate my wrte-up on him based on my assessment while on a trip to his constituency and I saw his unprecendented work, that he has done to his community especially his scholarship scheme to some indigent students who were able to go University. Today, some of the students, who passed through his scholarship are occupying sensitive positions within the public and private sector.

When he indicates his interest to vied for the position of Governor of Yobe State after the initial candidate of his party ANPP Alhaji Usman Albishir was disaqualified by EFCC, I know that the time for accelerated development of Yobe State has come with Mamman Bello Ali as the Governor of the state.

In less than two years on the saddle, late Gov. Mamman Bello Ali prove the doubting thomases wrong with the level of development of Yobe State. During his stewardship, his government opened a lot of opportunities for the people of Yobe State. He constructed a lot of roads within the state thereby opening up the state for both indusrial and commercial purposes.

He provided infrastructural development to secondary schools and also, provided science equipments.

He boosted the morale of teachers in Yobe State by providing them with good incentives like reviewing their salary scale.

He did not left out the health sector as he embarked on complete rehabilitation of a number of hospitals across the state. He did not stop at that as a new modern hospital is being constructed in Damaturu to alleviate people's suffering of going down to the Maiduguri Teaching hospital.

Late Gov. Mamman is a great archectect of prudent spending. He was the only Governor known so far that live in his personal residence whenever he was in Abuja on official duty and did not draw anything from the coffer of the state government. He was also the only Governor in the entire nineteen Northern States that does not accomodate the office of first lady in his belief, that his two wives has no any role to play in his government.

Late Gov. Mamman Ali is quite credited to be the only Senator that returned the bride of three million naira given to some senators during the hey day of former President Obasanjo third term ambition by publicly displaying his own on the floor of the hallowed chamber of the senate.

May Allah give the family of late Gov. Mamman Ali the fortitude to bear this irreparable loss. Amin.

BY
USMAN GARBA SANTURAKI
WROTR IN FROM HOUSE NO74, TAFIDA STR,
JIMETA-YOLA
USBATURAKI@YAHOO.COM