Nigeria @ 65: It’s been motion without movement – Adebayo

Leader of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), Prince Adewole Adebayo has lamented that more than six decades after the country’s independence, the country has been moving in circles.
Stressing that not much has been achieved, he said the elites have failed to wake up to the militant wing to go and get their uniform and take over the leadership of the country.
Adebayo bemoaned the level of rot in the system, ranging from pervasive crimes to corruption, insecurity, inflation and poverty, among others, attributing the development to poor leadership.
He decried the acceptance of evil in the system as a way of life, saying, “I think all the crimes, vices, and evil that could be committed are already permitted under the system. There’s no need for you to break it, it’s already performing. “So, they all remain there and we, who are democrats, are happy that we have had a broken civilian system”, he said.
Amid the lamentation of the country’s journey so far, Adebayo expressed hope of a greater tomorrow as he drew analogy between 1960 when the independence journey started and today.
He said: “We started the journey in October 1960 on foot but we didn’t walk diligently. We were just joking around with it. So we haven’t got to the destination.
“But, luckily for us, the journey that was started on foot, we now have cars to continue, we have aircraft to continue. So, there is hope in the horizon.”
He, however, blamed all the country’s woes, ranging from insecurity to corruption and poor infrastructural development among others, to poor leadership.
Painting a lucid picture of how poor the situation is, he said: “In Nigeria, you can be a pastor, a bishop or a general overseer without being a Christian. And you can be a chief imam without being a Muslim; you are just holding the position because the society permits that.
“In the same vein, you can be a professor without being an academic because it’s just a title for you to go and claim something or to massage your ego.
“You can be a senior advocate or a judge, without knowing justice, without paying your workers. You can be molesting and harassing your domestic staff and you achieve justice and nobody cares.
You don’t have a sense of justice, but you are the one who decides over justice for the whole country. And nobody cares. So, you’re going to have a senior police officer who steals and nothing happens”, he said.