Kaduna — Former governor of old Kaduna State, and National Chairman of the Peoples Redemption Party (PRP), Alhaji Balarabe Musa, has declared that revolution remains the only panacea to the myriad of problems afflicting the country.

Musa who stated this in an exclusive interview with Daily Champion on Nigeria's 49th Independence anniversary, attributed nation's lack of progress to corruption and bad leadership among the ruling class.

Musa said Nigeria since 1960 has been a history of problems and crises which, in his words, 'get worse every day.'

He said two things were responsible for this: "The second thing arises from the first. The first problem was colonialism. Nigeria was put together deliberately for a narrow purpose by British colonialists and colonialism did to Nigeria what it did to India and other countries colonized by Britain. That is the first problem.

"The second problem which arose from the first was that when Britain realised that colonialism was not in its economic interest, it decided to give independence to Nigeria.

"Certainly the independence did not come about because of the protest by Nigerians. It was simply because colonialism was no longer viable, so Britain decided to do what other colonial powers did. It handed over power to Nigeria under its control and made sure that power was handed over to those who were dependent on it or to those they could control.

"They handed over power which brought about a situation like this. Britain deliberately created two national leaders who emerged from its direct machination. These are Ahmadu Bello, the Sardauna of Sokoto and Chief Obafemi Awolowo. But two other leaders emerged from the natural realities in Nigeria and they are Dr. Nnamdi Azikiwe and Mallam Aminu Kano," he said.

He said, the structure left behind only provided a platform for failure by subsequent governments as the political leaders tended to fend for themselves and those around them to the misfortune of the majority.

"In some places, this combination of surrogates and nationalists could have gradually brought about a progressive development, but in Nigeria, it has failed and that is what we are coping with. Now why did this happen? Why is this situation continuing, a situation whereby there is one step forward and seven steps backward which by any imagination you cannot call progress? You may ask. This had happened and is happening because the history of colonialism and the history of political surrogacy brought about a political system or rather a social economic system based on colonialism and later, on self interest. This system based on self interest which you can call capitalism or neocolonialist capitalism has the objectives of limiting national development to a class system".

He said the social system controlling all developments in this country which is based on self interest is responsible for the poor state of the nation.

"It will always make the present administration worse than the previous administration and that is what is happening. Everybody recognizes this. It is unfortunate; it shows the level of degeneration, because it should be the present better than the previous. There ought to be improvement from the present, but there is none. Even if there is improvement in one area, you could see lack of improvement in other areas. That is why I said if we take one step forward, we will take seven steps backward."

Musa submitted that the only way to make Nigeria great was for a revolution to take place, which according to would address the system imbalance caused by post-colonial structural defects in the polity.

"A revolution means a fundamental change in the system controlling all development. There must be a revolutionary change from a system based on self interest to a system based on public interest. "

Also, former Senate President Mr. Ken Nnamani and Rev. Fr. Mathew Kukah have decried what they called the "retrogression" of Nigeria's political landscape since independence.

The duo made the remark at the launching of a book entitled "Nigeria Transits", to commemorate the country's 49th independence held in Abuja on Tuesday.

They said Nigerian youths had a great challenge ahead of them to correct the wrongs of the past.

Nnamani accused successive leaders of the country of failing to learn from the mistakes of the past.

"In the 10 years of trying to consolidate democracy, in terms of civilian to civilian transition, yes we can say we have done very well.

"But in other indices of democratic principles, we are regressing.

"In 1999, the Supreme Court of Nigeria collectively said our election was okay; in 2003, one Supreme Court judge said the election was generally flawed and in 2007 three Supreme Court judges said the election was a sham and fraudulent.

"So what that means is there is a regression, no one can do it alone, let us all know that we have no other country, we have a lot of challenges," he said.

Nnamani said the double standards of leaders are a source of concern for the citizens, who expect them to lead by example.

"When I came here some minutes to 10 this morning, not all the ministers who were supposed to be here were present and we are talking about rebranding, retooling and reorientation of Nigeria, we must lead by example," he said.

In his part, Kukah said after several years of criticising Nigeria, he now preferred to think about the country 50 years from now.

Kukah said he had come to appreciate "the complication and the complex nature of architecture of governance, and noted that Nigeria was not short of men and women with good intention.

"But guiding a nation requires much more; my argument is that the problem with Nigeria is not leadership, it is that of conceptual confusion that make us mistakenly call the people that are leading us leaders when the people are actually accidentally holding office.

"Office-holding is not therefore leadership," he said.

Kukah said Nigeria must be prepared to "cope with the energy and expertise that would be unleashed on the country" by young Nigerians living abroad.

He expressed the hope that the next generation of Nigerian leaders would play politics on the grounds of knowledge and intellectual ability against present sentiments on tribe, money and religion.

Afenifere Renewal Group (ARG), described Nigeria as "fumbling and wobbling."

Yinka Odumakin, National Publicity Secretary of the group said any path taken either by an individual or community for 49 years and is leading farther from the desired destination should be subjected to review if such an individual or community is not prepared to end in perdition.

He said in most of the 49 years of our existence as a country, we have abandoned the route that any multi-ethnic country like Nigeria should take by adopting over-centralization in a supposed Federal Republic.

"It is no accident that at 49, all the failures of over-centralization manifesting in corruption, waste, inefficiency and collapse are staring us in the face anywhere we turn to," he said. Every institution that is "National" are either totally collapsed or are in the process of doing so.

Odumakin named Nigerian Telecommunications (NITEL), Nigerian Railways Corporation (NRC), Nigeria Airways (NA), Nigerian National Shipping Line (NNSL), National Electric Power Authority (NEPA), Nigerian Police Force (NPF), as a few examples.

Odumakin pointed out that at 49, 76 per cent of our populace are classified as poor; 300 of 1,000 children born in our country don't celebrate their first birthday, the life expectancy for males is 45 and that the over $300b out of $800b generated since independence have been stolen by leaders and the sixth largest producer of oil in the world ranks among the last 20 in virtually all international indices for 148 countries.

Also, the Campaign for Democracy (CD), said people should use the anniversary to take stock of the wasted opportunities, misrule and rascality of the political elite in the last 49 years and insist on change without delay.

Dr. Joe Okei-Odumakin, president of the group, said with unquantifiable wealth, most of which have gone into private pockets of rulers in 49 years, Nigeria is today tottering and cascading to the abyss of total failure. "There is darkness, hunger, despondency and frustration that pervade the land," she said.

She said: "It is so amazing how delinquent the ruling elites in Nigeria have become that they still pretend that all is well in our country. They continue to display opulent wealth in the midst of mass misery of the people and want the party to continue.

"They have not bothered to trace the link between the violent robberies, kidnappings and other violent crimes in the country and their penchant for lootocracy. In a society where crooks and financial criminals are the celebrated political leaders, can we but have anything different from what we see in the land today?

The Nigerian political class (Civilian and their military cousins) have exhausted their life span. They cannot play any modernizing role anymore and incapable of any reformation.

"The challenge for the people is to get organized and take the country back from these decadent forces and re-order Nigeria so that its resources can be used for the benefit of the people," she said.

On his part, the governor of Enugu State, Sullivan Iheanacho Chime enjoined well-meaning Nigerians to support different tiers of governments in their various development initiatives aimed at uplifting the standard living of the entire populace.

Governor Chime made this plea in his speech to mark Nigeria's 49th independence anniversary.

He said: "As our country marks this milestone in our march to nationhood, I will enjoin fellow Nigerians to join hands with governments at all levels to make our country better for all to live.

"As proud inheritors of that creation, the challenge is for us all to keep the dream of independence alive. In this period of global economic meltdown, it will also be fatal to overlook the urgency that this day demands. This is, therefore, a wake-up call for all Nigerians to demonstrate abiding faith in our country and to look forward to the future with hope," he said.