Aarebirin Hon. Princess Folashade Olabanji-Oba’s Personality Profile & Service to Humanity– Envisages Ikorodu To The World.

 By Araba, Olawale Enifenilanfe:

Aarebirin Hon. Princess (Dr) Folashade Olabanji-Oba, also known as Florence-Grace Aishat Akankeade was born July 24th, 1964 who is the first daughter of late Alhaja Chief Sikirat Atinuke Atobajaye Olabanji (Majayalolo), Iya Sunnah General of Nigeria, and Nurul Islam International Alasalatu of Nigeria.

Aarebirin Hon Princess Dr Folashade Olabanji-Oba, a Public Administrator, empathetic, hardworking, dynamically proactive with a heart of Gold is excellence personified was born into a wealthy background, the home of a textile merchant mother and a father who were into real estate in Lagos Island.

She had her primary education in Offa, Kwara State. Being the first child. Hence, the need for distance learning. His Father felt that her mum would spoil her pretty much; so he put her in the boarding house and from there, she went to the Federal Government Girls’ College, Owerri, in Imo State. From there again, moved to the United Kingdom where she went to study Business Administration and Marketing at the American College in London and after that, she arrived back in Nigeria.

She had her primary education in Offa, Kwara State. Being the first child. Hence, the need for distance learning. His Father felt that her mum would spoil her pretty much; so he put her in the boarding house and from there, she went to the Federal Government Girls’ College, Owerri, in Imo State. From there again, moved to the United Kingdom where she went to study Business Administration and Marketing at the American College in London and after that, she arrived back in Nigeria.

Dr. Princess Folashade Olabanji-Oba has a first degree in Business Administration, and a postgraduate diploma in computerized business systems, marketing and management, and theology.

Has a master’s degree also in theology and pastoral leadership. Being born to an extremely successful textile merchant she was led down the road of the clothing and retail industry and successfully went on to establishing boutiques and her clothing line in Nigeria.

Having completed her studies in England, she relocated to Nigeria and then America. She worked in an insurance firm, and real estate sector before relocating back to Nigeria.

Dr. Princess Folashade Oba grew into a blend of royalty, wealth and class. Happily married with children to ex-Ben TV, London Director and social analyst, Prince Gbola Oba, Princess Folashade Oba is an epitome of beauty and brawn.
A real estate and brokerage expert, Princess Folashade Oba returned to Nigeria in 2006 after 20 years abroad. She founded Pacific Capital Ltd, a leading real estate and brokerage firm in Lagos and annexe in London.

She established an NGO ‘Shelter of Grace Foundation (SGF) through which she did a lot of philanthropic activities benefitting thousands in the Ikorodu axis of Lagos.

Dr. Princess Folashade Olabanji-Oba is the Executive Vice Chairman of the Ikorodu local government area; A Founder/ GDG of the Asiwaju Distinguished Ambassadors Movement (ADAM); Real estate /Media consultant; A Nation Builder and Administrator per excellence, Philanthropist, Entrepreneur and a Human rights Activist.

Having established one of the fastest-growing real estate firms in Southern California at the time, also an alumnus of the Pan African University with courses in real estate development.

Her Journey back to Nigeria was a journey persuaded by her love for Nigeria and her family. Upon relocating to Nigeria, she founded the “Shelter of Grace Foundation” which is a medium to empower the masses and advocate for women’s rights and family development being a politician of repute and integrity.
She is a party chieftain of the APC; she’s also the National Chairman, of the Association of Local Government Vice Chairmen of Nigeria.
Dr. Princess Folashade-Oba aka Beyoncé joined politics to make a difference – Princess Folashade-Oba she said in an interview with LaRoyal Global CommunityNews, Araba Olawale Enifenilanfe.

She spoke on many issues concerning the council, the contentious local government autonomy and her sojourn in politics.

Question: Being a successful businesswoman from the Diaspora like you, what’s the motivating factor that got you interested in politics?
For me, politics is a legacy project. It is about the people, giving back to the people. It is about blessing the source of those that had blessed me ( late Alhaja Chief Sikirat Atinuke Atobajaye Olabanji (Majayalolo), Iya Sunnah General of Nigeria), of their blessed memories she reverted acollade. “One thing we all owe to Mother Earth is to make sure that we leave it better than we met it”. That’s a question we don’t often ask ourselves because we tend to get carried away with always wanting more. But sometimes, we need to evaluate how we have been able to achieve that. “I mean not forgetting your primary purpose of what you aspire to be maybe when you were younger”. If you have fallen short, you need to see where you can make it up. So, for someone like me, I am a sucker for love. “I have been blessed with the gift of people, especially my mother”. She laboured for me to have my voice. She laboured for me to go to school. She didn’t go to school as she was a sickle-seller. She struggled and was able to live to the ripe age of 85 years.

“As her first daughter”, she taught me so many things. But one major thing was that life is not all about money, that you must always add value. Yes, money is needed to make the world go round. But always make sure that wherever you are, you add value. Contribute, participate, shoulder and nurture people. Nurturing is something that comes with womanhood. So, with my pedigree, people will wonder, “Why this society?”

Yes, I lived abroad, I lived in the United Kingdom for eleven years and the United States for eighteen years. But my mother is from here, And for so many reasons when I was older in life, I realized I must come back home, especially when both my parents became old and sick and I thought that for somebody who had done so much for me, I must give something back.
So, that was one of the reasons I decided to relocate initially to Nigeria to take care of them. But in coming back to Nigeria, “I looked around me and I was like whao!”, things were not what I thought I would meet. What a culture shock! Coming from an environment that is well planned and structured to Nigeria where it was difficult to plan, the gap was quite much.

But, there is something in me that doesn’t give up easily, that there is always a diamond in the dirt. Sometimes we don’t appreciate what we have. We are stuck with looking at someone else’s green grass.

But if we really water our own grass, take care of our environment take care of what God blessed us with, we will also prosper. Honestly, I believe in this entity called Nigeria. I believe we have all that it takes to be ranked among the greatest nations on earth.

How do you then fit in? How do you make a difference in a world where everything seems to be going wrong?

Like I said earlier, “I got a culture shock when I came back home”. It wasn’t easy initially, but as they say, love conquers all. So, I had to reprogrammed my brain. “God never make mistakes”, there are no accidents with him. There must be a reason why things are not going well and there must be a way to realign it.

So, I started to think, “How can I make a change, how can I be a blessing to my society”. Yes, I have acquired all this knowledge, but how do I give back? So, that’s how we got to where we are. And the more I was here; the more I fell in love with the community. So, I started to study the system and it took about one year to do that, Yes, I am a real estate person, that’s what I have done almost my entire life.

My mother, even though she was into retail trading and all that, was a developer. She invested heavily in real estate. I didn’t quickly learn that, but I know she put that in me. It was later in life that I realized that she had really impacted the nitty-gritty of the real estate business in me.
Although she was not formally educated, she sure knew what she was doing. Later, I started to volunteer to serve the people of this community when I came home to ask what could be done and how could I be of help. Gradually, I started to make an impact.

In fact, that is what you call politics. When you look at world politics, it has been so much demonized that nobody wants to touch it. As a first child and daughter, some limitations were set. My dad was a person who didn’t believe initially in the girl-child. He was initially against investing in the girls, with the pervasive kind of thinking in the olden days that was against investing so much in a girl-child who would end up in another man’s house.

But my mother saw no limitations. She was the kind of person who believed a girl-child could even do better. She must have held on to that belief because her father invested in her too. She was supposed to be a sickle-seller and abandoned to die young, but she became Kokumo who refused to die. At the end of the day, she was the pillar of the family.
The ones that went to school didn’t match up to what she became in life. And so, she said there is something called destiny, you can rework it, and you can rewrite it if you put much energy into it and have the heart to do it. And your heart, if it is right, will lead you to greatness, because God always looks at the mind. That’s how I found myself here.

Your mother was a pillar who supported your foray into politics. Was it because she didn’t have male children?

No, not at all. She did. I have a male brother. She had other children too, but like I said, she was my best friend, I don’t know what it was, but there was surely something between us. I think she saw a bigger, better version of her in me, and she made me believe because I was a shy little girl when I was growing up, with no confidence, nothing.

But she made me take up the leadership role in our family by taking care of my siblings. Also, she will wake me up by three in the morning and leave the house by 4.30am for the market. Now, if I go to bed by 2.00am, I must wake up by 4.00am. And I don’t need an alarm to do that. So, those things she programmed in me, that everything is structured, you must know how to balance and juggle it.

One important thing is that there will always be challenges but you must never quit as tough times shall pass. I got that from my mum. And it has helped me greatly. And the terrain can sometimes be very hostile. But, “I pinch myself that no two days are the same. What you need is constant encouragement”. Because it is like this for me, I have to improve it for people coming after me. What I am doing now is helping others and trying to make life easier for them. “It is not about me; It is all about Growing Ikorodu”.

God bless Ikorodu!
God bless Lagos State!
God bless Nigeria!
Ikorodu to the world; she envisaged.

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