The family of the man who designed Nigeria’s national flag have told the BBC they have given up on waiting for a promised state funeral a year after his death.
Instead, Taiwo Michael Akinkunmi, who died a year ago at the age of 87, will be buried this week in Oyo State, where he lived.
Akinkunmi, known to many as “Mr. Flagman” and whose house was painted in the distinctive green and white colours of the national flag, was a humble man.
But his son hopes that at his farewell party, which is being funded by Oyo State, he will be remembered for the design that became a symbol of a united Nigeria.
“We must give him the befitting burial he deserves,” his son Akinwumi Akinkunmi told the BBC’s Focus on Africa podcast.
Taiwo Akinkunmi always said he was an unlikely flag designer. He entered a competition for a new design prior to Nigeria’s independence from the United Kingdom in October 1960.
He was studying electrical engineering in London at the time and saw an advertisement in the newspaper about the competition.
According to flag expert Whitney Smith, 3,000 designs were submitted, “many of which were of great complexity.”
But Akinkunmi’s was simple, with equal vertical green-white-green stripes. It was a replacement for the colonial flag, which featured the British Union Jack and a six-pointed green star under a red disk.
Akinkunmi’s original design included a red sun surrounded by rays at the center. This was intended “as a symbol of divine protection and guidance,” Mr. Smith wrote in the Encyclopaedia Britannica.
However, the committee left out the sun and awarded the then 23-year-old £100 (then $280) for his winning design.
Akinkunmi always said that his inspiration came from his childhood, having traveled and lived in different places in Nigeria.
Born in Ibadan in the southwest, now the capital of Oyo State, he spent his early years in the northern part of the country because of his parents’ work. He grew up in what he himself described as a happy polygamous family, one of his father’s 10 children.
He returned to Ibadan to finish his education. He once told ThisDay journalist Funke Olade that his secondary school was like a “mini Nigeria” because there were students from all over the country.
Nigeria is home to more than 300 ethnic groups. Although Africa’s most populous country has no official religion, the country is roughly divided into a predominantly Muslim north and a predominantly Christian south. However, there are also many mixed communities.
For Akinkunmi, the green in his flag symbolized the country’s rich agricultural heritage, while the white represented peace and unity.
“It is significant that Nigeria, like many other culturally diverse countries, has chosen a simple flag design. A more complex design would have explicitly honored some ethnic and religious groups and excluded others,” Mr. Smith wrote.
Agriculture was always close to Akinkunmi’s heart and he looked forward to returning to Nigeria after independence to work in the Ministry of Agriculture, where he served as a civil servant until his retirement in 1994.
For much of his life, few people knew his contribution to the country. Wherever he lived, he reportedly painted the outside of his house green and white.
It was not until Nigeria celebrated 50 years of independence that he was recognised as one of the 50 outstanding Nigerians.
According to his son, a politician from Oyo State later lobbied for a national award and pension. In 2014, he was made an Officer of the Order of the Federal Republic (OFR), one of Nigeria’s highest honours.
After Akinkunmi’s death last year, a senator successfully introduced a motion to give him a state funeral.
However, no plans were ever made and while they waited, Akinkunmi’s family paid 2,000 naira ($1.30; £1.00) a day to keep the body in a mortuary.
The son of the flag’s designer said they learned in June that the Ministry of Arts’ National Institute for Cultural Orientation (Nico) had been tasked with arranging the state funeral.
But apart from one phone call, he said the agency had not communicated further.
He fears that if he waits any longer, his father’s name will be discredited.
Then the Oyo State government decided to intervene to finance the funeral rites for the flag designer.
“My late father was a laid-back man who didn’t want his image tarnished,” his son told the BBC.
“He was well-educated, a very intelligent man and a good person who everyone wanted to be around,” he added.
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