Frontline politician and Nigeria Ambassador to Spain,Chief Demola Seriki is dead.
Reports said the Lagos socialite fondly called America Kokoye died peacefully surrounded by his family in Madrid, Spain, Thursday, 15 December, 2022.
Already announcement of his death has been made by the family.
He was aged 63 having been born on 30 November, 1959.
As a junior public servant, Demola Seriki was not satisfied with his clerical job at the Lagos City Council because his secondary school qualification would not guarantee him possible promotion to the senior ranks of public service, so he proceeded to New York, United State, where he studied for and earned Bachelor of Arts and Master of Science degrees in the field of Accounting, Finance & Management from the City University of New York. He also attended Harvard University John F. Kennedy School of Government, Cambridge Massachusetts where he completed a Senior Executive Education and earned a Certificate in National and International Security.
Seriki was the senatorial candidate for Lagos Central District constituency on the platform of the defunct National Republican Convention (NRC) in 1992.
In 1998, he was elected a member of the House of Representatives from the Lagos Island Federal Constituency on the ticket of the defunct United Nigeria Congress Party (UNCP). This victory was short-lived, with the abrupt end of the General Abacha regime and the inception of General Abdulsalam Abubakar’s transitional regime.
With the emergence of the 4th Republic, he was appointed a National Fund Raising Committee member in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for the 1999 general elections. The PDP also appointed him as a member of the Candidate and Party Relations Committee for the Obasanjo/Atiku Presidential election. From 2000 to 2002, Demola Seriki emerged as the PDP Party Chairman of Lagos Island Local Government Area, and later, in 2003, as the party’s flag bearer to the House of Assembly, for Lagos Island Federal Constituency. In 2005, he began serving as Secretary of the Lagos State PDP Disciplinary Committee. In 2005, until 2006, he was appointed as the Lagos State Vice Chairman of the PDP, after which, in 2007, he campaigned to become Senator for Lagos Central Senatorial District.
In 2011, he defected from PDP to Action Congress of Nigeria.
He is currently the Nigerian Ambassador to the Kingdom of Spain since January 2021, with concurrent accreditation as a Permanent Representative of Nigeria to the United Nations World Tourism Organization-UNWTO.
He previously served as: Minister of State for Interior between 2009 and March 2010; Minister of State for Defence 2008 to 2009;
Supervising Minister for Mines and Steel Development, October 2008 to December 2008; Minister of State for Agriculture and Water Resources, 2007 to 2008.
In May 2009, the Oba of Lagos, HRH Oba Rilwan Akiolu conferred on Demola Seriki the chieftaincy title the Otun Aare of Lagos.
The businessman and public administrator was married to Wosilat Okoya, younger sister of billionaire businessman, Chief Rasak Okoya and popular lawyer, Solape, daughter of society woman, Bisi Shaba of the famed Bisket Supermarket.
Oluremi Demola Seriki was the first woman and wife in his life, she is the CEO of Remmy’s, a household/beauty shop on Adeniran Ogunsanya Street, Surulere.
•By The Gazelle News
