Nigeria flag is the national flag of Nigeria, a country on the west coast of Africa. The flag has three vertical stripes of equal width. The center stripe is white, representing unity and peace. The two outer stripes are green. They represent agriculture.
Over the centuries, a number of African kingdoms ruled various parts of the area that is now Nigeria. In the 1400’s, the Portuguese became the first Europeans to set up trading stations there. Other European nations soon followed. The United Kingdom gained control of the region in the late 1800’s and early 1900’s. In 1914, it joined the northern and southern parts of the region to form the Colony and Protectorate of Nigeria. During the 1940’s and 1950’s, Nigerians moved toward independence.
As the time for independence neared, Nigerians established a national planning committee. In 1959, the committee held a contest to design a national flag. Nigerians submitted nearly 3,000 suggestions. The winning idea came from Michael Taiwo Akinkunmi, a student from the city of Ibadan in southwestern Nigeria.
Akinkunmi’s flag originally included a red sun at the center of the white stripe, but the judges deleted the sun from the final design. The national flag became official when Nigeria gained independence on Oct. 1, 1960.
