The Diplomat
Nigeria’s new Ambassador to Spain, Demola Seriki, handed over on Wednesday the Style Copies of his Letters of Credence to the Second Introducer of Ambassadors of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Maria Sebastian de Erice.
Demola Seriki, 61, was appointed ambassador by Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari last January to fill a post that had been vacant since the departure of the previous ambassador, Susan Aderonke Folarin. Seriki is one of 52 ambassadorial appointments not members of the diplomatic career made by Buhari. Apart from being ambassador to Spain, Demola Seriki has also been appointed Nigeria’s permanent representative to the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), which is headquartered in Madrid.
The new ambassador is a prominent Nigerian politician, professor and businessman. Born in Lagos in November 1959, his professional career began in the financial world. After a brief stint at the International Bank for West Africa Ltd (IBWA – now Afribank), he moved to New York to work for Rochester, Koskolowsky and Co. and Dollar Dry Dock Bank in the second half of the 1980s.
Upon his return to Nigeria, Seriki joined the Equity and Trust Finance Company Limited as a director, before serving as chairman of the Lagos State Sports Council between 1992 and 1994, from where he made the leap to politics in the ranks of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). Between 2007 and 2008 he was Minister of State for Agriculture and Water Resources, in 2008 he was Supervising Minister of Mines and Steel Development, between 2008 and 2009 he served as Minister of Defense and between 2009 and 2010 he was Minister of State for the Interior.
