- Amid Tinubu’s tainted list
The family of the late Herbert Macaulay, widely regarded as the Father of Nigerian Nationalism, has publicly rejected the posthumous state pardon recently granted by President Bola Tinubu, condemning the manner in which the honour was conferred.
The President’s decision included Macaulay in a general clemency list alongside several other individuals, some of whom were convicted of serious crimes such as drug trafficking and murder.
The family, represented by notable descendants, held a press conference in Lagos to express their strong disapproval.
Their main contention is not with the government’s intention to clear Macaulay’s record, but with the undignified grouping on the list.
The family argued: “The man who lit the torch of Nigerian freedom” should not have his legacy “lumped together with drug lords and other manner of criminals” in a mass pardon exercise.
The family emphasized that Macaulay was a revered patriot whose colonial-era convictions—one in 1913 for alleged fraud related to an estate he administered, and another for sedition—were acts of political persecution by the British authorities aimed at silencing his nationalist opposition and barring him from public office.
Instead of a general pardon, the Macaulay family has demanded that the Federal government grant the nationalist a distinct and independent honor.
They stressed that a figure of Macaulay’s stature, who pioneered the anti-colonial struggle and co-founded the National Council of Nigeria and the Cameroons (NCNC), deserves an isolated and singular gesture that unequivocally exonerates him from the colonial injustice.
Furthermore, some descendants insisted that what is required is not a “pardon,” which implies a forgiveness of guilt, but a full exoneration to completely rectify the historical injustice.
They also called on the government to permanently immortalize his name by naming a major national monument or institution after him, asserting that “Herbert Macaulay’s name must stand alone… among those who built the nation.”
The family acknowledged the spirit of the government’s attempt to correct a historical wrong but deemed the execution of the clemency to be demeaning to the memory of the nationalist icon.
