Ambassador Ayoola Olukanni, a career diplomat of over three decades experience has served in various missions abroad including Kenya, Republic of Seychelles, Australia New Zealand, Fiji, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands. In this interview with Ibrahim Apekhade Yusuf he shares reminiscences of his career thus far.
To say that Ambassador Ayoola Olukanni has seen it all is clearly an understatement. The career diplomat of over three decades experience has traversed different continents across the globe and thankful for the many choices life bestowed on him.
His career portraiture is as rich as it is varied. He once served as Deputy Permanent Representative/Ag Permanent Representative of Nigeria to United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) & United Nations Human Settlement Programme (UN HABITAT) and later, Deputy Head of Mission/Acting High Commissioner to Kenya and Republic of Seychelles.
He was also the spokesperson of the Nigerian Foreign Ministry between March 2007 and January 2010, and he moved to Vienna-Austria as Minister/Charge D’Affaires. He was promoted to Ambassador in 2011 and then deployed as Nigeria’s Ambassador in Canberra, Australia, with concurrent accreditation to New Zealand, Fiji, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea and Solomon Islands.
From being a spokesperson, he proceeded to Vienna, Austria as Minister/Charge D’affairs.
In 2011, an ambassador, he was deployed to Canberra, Australia. It was in Australia he attained the age of 60, and therefore retired from service.
Going back memory lane, the Ilesha-born diplomat shared wonderful memories of growing up through adult life and then active service both at home and foreign missions abroad.
“Diplomacy is the best of the services; it is the best job. You cannot be rich as a diplomat but you are educated and cosmopolitan,” he said with obvious pride.
But he was however quick to admit that providence had a hand in his career choice.
“My father had a role to play in my career choice,” he began.
As he prepared to go for tertiary education, his father, he recalled, wanted him to be a doctor, but Olukanni wanted to be pilot.
He went on to study political science in Ife from 1975-1979, where due to his love for the arts, he became editor of the campus gossip magazine: The Cobra. He was also a part of a drama group on campus.
While in school he chose to be on the political left as the university he attended was vibrant with radical ideas. According to him, it was a glorious period of education in Nigeria where companies and government conducted and completed recruitment exercises right in the campuses.
He applied to be External Affairs Officer through the Federal Civil Service Commission and was later posted to serve in Radio Plateau where he got a chance to produce his own programme –Corpers’ Corner.
After NYSC, he returned to Lagos, became a stringer for the NTA while he tried to get a job with broadcasting houses, but because they only wanted newscasters, while he wanted to produce his own programmes, he continued stringing.
“God has a way of handling our affairs as people since we are in his hands. So I was on my way for rehearsals at NTA for For Better, for Worse soap, and decided to collect my letter on the way at Republic Building, Marina in Lagos. On July 29, 1980 I signed for my letter and took up a new career.”
He however loved acting so much he continued to act on TV even after he was admitted into diplomacy, until a senior Ambassador chided him over his continued appearance on TV as an actor.
His first stint as a diplomat led him to Brussels, Belgium in 1982 as attaché.
Upon his return in 1983, he went on to the University of Lagos to do a Postgraduate Diploma in International law. After that he went on to the Permanent Mission of Nigeria to the UN from 1986-1989 which is a very rare privilege for any diplomat. He worked on several committees including CEDAW, anti-Apartheid committee, among others.
His period at the UN, he recollected was as one of the best ever because he was being polished like a precious rough stone through exposure to all issues including gender and development, human rights, disarmament, international law, and others.
That same period was when issues on the environment began to take centre stage, and he became interested so much that when he returned to Nigeria in 1989, he went back to Unilag to do a Masters in International Law and Diplomacy with focus on International Environmental Law. Returning to the classroom after New York was like examining what he had done at the UN.
While in New York, he was part of the committee that started the preparation for Rio Summit.
“I was sent to Israel after my Masters –very exciting. Then Ambassador Olisa Emeka was Foreign Minister. These were people who brought us up and taught us this job. As Councillor (Political, Culture and Information) I had to also follow up the Oslo Peace Accord to try and resolve the age-old Israeli-Palestinian crisis, and the Middle-East peace process, after the Gulf war of 1991,” he recalled.
He also had stint at the bilateral air services desk, and later became the Pilgrims Liaison Officer for Christians Pilgrims from Nigeria, but he believes that state should not be so closely involved in religion, arguing that it is a personal issue
Source:THE NATION
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