Nigerian Flag Designer Buried After Year-Long Wait for State Honors

A year after the death of Pa Taiwo Michael Akinkunmi, the man who designed Nigeria’s iconic flag, his family has finally decided to bury him. Akinkunmi, who passed away on August 29, 2023, at the age of 87, had remained unburied as his family awaited a promised state burial from the government—a promise that was never fulfilled.

Akinkunmi created the green-and-white flag while studying in London during the late 1950s. His design, symbolizing Nigeria‘s agricultural wealth and the peace and unity among its diverse ethnic groups, won a national competition and was unveiled on Nigeria’s Independence Day on October 1, 1960. Despite his significant contribution to the nation’s identity, Akinkunmi lived a quiet life, working for the Ministry of Agriculture, with little public recognition until later years.

In 2014, he was honored with the Officer of the Order of the Federal Republic (OFR), one of Nigeria’s highest civilian awards. Following his death, there were calls for a state burial, but no concrete plans were made, forcing his family to keep his body in a mortuary for over a year.

Despite public outcry and a directive from the Ministry of Art, Culture, and the Creative Economy for the National Institute for Cultural Orientation (NICO) to ensure a state funeral, the promise went unfulfilled. In the end, the Oyo state government stepped in to support the family, allowing them to finally give Akinkunmi a befitting burial in early September, shortly after the one-year anniversary of his passing.