Reactions have continued to trail the deci-sion of the Federal Government to identify prominent Nigerians who played some parts in the series of agitations that culminated in the return of the country to democratic in 1999.

In all, President Bola Tinubu conferred national honours on over 80 Nige-rians living and deceased during his Democracy Day address to the country with many of those that bene-fitted being activists who fought for the actualization of the June 12, 1993 Presi-dential election believed to have been won by business mogul, the late Chief Mos-hood Kashimawo Olawale Abiola.

Prominent amongst those honoured were Abi-ola’s wife, the late Alhaja Kudirat Abiola, environ-mental activist, Ken Sa-ro-Wiwa, human rights ac-tivists such as Chief Femi Falana and others.

Also awarded were oth-er prominent Nigerians such as the late Chief of Staff, Supreme Headquar-ters and a chieftain of the Social Democratic Party, the late Major-General She-hu Musa Yar’Adua, and a former Chief of Defence Staff, Lt.-General Alani Ip-oola Akinrinade.

The two of them were awarded the two most prestigious awards of GCFR and GCON respec-tively.

However there were no-ticeable omissions in the list such as a former governor of the old Ondo State in the Second Republic, Chief Michael Adekunle Ajasin, who was the leader of the National Democratic Coali-tion (NADECO), the organ-isation that championed the return of the country to democratic rule.

Other prominent Ni-gerians omitted include, Commodore Ebitu Ukiwe, Chief Anthony Enahoro, the late Major General Adeyinka Adebayo, Com-modore Dan Suleiman, Dr Chukwuemeka Ezeife, Professor Anya O. Anya, Colonel Yohanna Madaki, and Reverend Father Mo-ses Adasu.

Reacting to the develop-ment in a telephone chat on Friday, one of the promi-nent agitators, Chief Mrs Kofoworola Bucknor-Ak-erele, stated that her omis-sion from the recognition showed that President Tinubu still abhor some misgivings against her.

Bucknor-Akerele was the deputy to President Tinubu when the two were elected governor and deputy governor of Lagos State under the banner of the now defunct Alliance for Democracy (AD).

They however fell apart barely before the take-off of the governor, prompting the resignation of Bucknor-Akerele from the government when it became apparent that the state House of Assembly was acting on the prompt-ing of the then Governor to impeach Bucknor-Akerele from office.

Reacting to the develop-ment, she stated, “I am not in any way surprised that I was omitted from the list. Not in any way surprising, but my reaction to that is that possibly President Tinubu still has some griev-ances against me based on what happened between us while in government.” child of the late Chief Aja-sin, Chief Tokunbo Ajasin, blamed the omission on ‘bureaucratic gaffe’ saying that the president and offi-cials of the state would not have willfully omitted his father’s name.

In a statement made available to newsmen in Lagos on Friday, Ajasin wrote, “Much as I hate to get personal, I would be ly-ing if I didn’t say that I and other members of my fam-ily were rather surprised that the name of our dad was not among those hon-oured by President Tinubu as he doled out National honours to June 12 heroes.

“Besides, I have been inundated with calls from friends and well-wishers wondering why my late dad’s name, Chief Michael Adekunle Ajasin was omit-ted from the list.

“As is characteristic of the Ajasin family, our deeds are mostly altruistic, since there is usually no craving for any reward, notwith-standing our privations. Consequently, our deeds and performances very often go unnoticed, unrec-ognised.

“However, it is uncon-scionable that the leader of the group (NADECO), best known for fighting the mili-tary and bringing about the much-touted democracy, never got a single mention in the scheme of June 12 cel-ebration/anniversary.

“I do not know whether this conspicuous omission was deliberate or not, but let it be known that Chief Michael Adekunle Aja-sin, CFR in his lifetime, doubled as the leader of Afenifere and NADECO, the two organisations that were the arrowheads and in the forefront of the fight against military dictator-ship.

“It was Afenifere that provided the leadership for all the other activists and civil society organisa-tions, which included the Campaign for Democracy (CD), Committee for the Defence of Human Rights (CDHR), Movement for National Reformation (MNR), National Con-science Party (NCP) Con-cerned Professionals (CP), etc,” he wrote.

Citing a publication of a former Ogun State Gov-ernor and chieftain of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief Olusegun Osoba, who in his book, “Battle lines: Adventures in Power,” credited his late father as a key member of the 49 founding signato-ries of NADECO.

“While Chief Ajasin was the leader of NADE-CO, Chief Anthony Enaho-ro was the Deputy Leader, and Mr Ayo Opadokun was the General Secretary. None of these names ap-peared on the published list!

“So what happened? Why are the bureaucrats getting it wrong? At the risk of being immodest, my fa-ther, our family and indeed the Owo community were subjected to all sorts of risks from the marauding goons of the Abacha regime,” he wrote.

Omoyele Sowore, who is the convener of the #Revo-lutionNow movement and the former presidential can-didate of the African Action Congress (AAC), in virtual-ly all his social media han-dles, said that he would have taken legal action for defamation if his name was “mistakenly” included in any national honours list released by President Bola Tinubu.

In a terse statement he issued on Friday, Sowore wrote, “If I were mistaken-ly included by Tinubu on his ‘National Award’ list, I would not only reject and denounce the award, but also take definitive legal action for defamation.”