Olufunso Adesoye “Iyanda” Oke (Funso) was born on 24th May 1972 in Lagos to Deacon Timothy and Deaconess Folasayo Oke. Funso, who turned out to be a champion of the downtrodden and less privileged in his later life, always loved to tout the humble suburbs of Mushin as his place of birth - an effort to boost his ‘street credibility’. His detractors, seeking to discredit his leftist credentials sought to argue that LUTH (his real place of birth) was an uppity part of Mushin.
Funso received his early education at Grace Children’s School and was also part of the second set of the Nigerian Navy Secondary School Ojo. He subsequently attended the University of Lagos (UNILAG) where he studied Accountancy. After gaining strong work experience, Funso went back to school, attending the Lagos Business School (LBS) for his MBA program. He subsequently became a strong apostle of the LBS’s MBA program. Funso loved to read and ended up with a cerebral capacity for some of the world’s weirdest issues, and deep relationships with veteran British journalist – Kaye Whiteman. Funso charmed people, made friends and retained friends with his cerebral capacity and his ability to unearth very weird issues in great details. Funso subsequently earned a Post-Graduate Diploma from the University of Leicester. He also attended short courses with Euromoney in Lagos, the PPP specialist trainer IP3 Washington DC (USA) and the International Finance Faculty (London, UK).
Funso was the Head, Advisory at Synergy Capital. He has 20 years of experience spanning Investment Banking, ECM and DCM strategy, Business Development, Marketing and Media sector entrepreneurship. He led the advisory team in a project valued at $800million Debt & $250million Equity raise for a large indigenous player. Other deals include a $6million Bridge and $75million Capex structuring for emerging upstream firm. His advisory work in various downstream sector projects included PLC’s organic restructuring and fund raise, M&A and acquisitions for startup franchise.
Funso was Head of Research/ Head, Corporate Strategy at BGL PLC when the firm completed a N35billion Private Placement. While at BGL he crafted a Turnaround Roadmap for the firm whilst being responsible for Special Projects- Including BGL rightsizing, State Govt. bond issues, New Products Developments in Stockbroking, Asset Management, Corporate Finance, Structured Finance and Public Sector Advisory subsidiaries; Funso was earlier the Head of Research at Afrinvest Nigeria, where he designed the firm’s main market investment strategy tool – The Afrinvest Extrapolation’s Sheet.
Funso was a man of several parts – religion and charity, family, politics, football/sports and career and he pursued each of these parts with fervour and infectious passion. He was firmly rooted in Christianity from his early days in Shepherdhill Baptist Church Obanikoro, like other members of the Oke family in Lagos. He later transferred his membership to Ikoyi Baptist Church. He believed and practised the doctrine of “faith with works” which led him to pursue various charitable missions sometimes conscripting his friends into these missions. He once led members of his Research Team in BGL into joining a group “Nigerians Must Work”, an initiative that had been set up by his colleague seeking to create job openings for unemployed youths. He also became a Governing Board Member of another non-government organisation - Whiteslate Foundation, aimed at increasing literacy rates in rural Lagos. He constantly agonised about the state of the country and sought to translate his anger into action. This resulted in contributing his quota to various progressive groups like the “Save Nigeria Group” and Prison Evangelism. He also once suffered incarceration at the dreaded Panti Police Station after joining an anti-government demonstration and refused to be bailed out unless the rest of his co-detainees were also released. He was a classic Refusenik. He once led a two-man team in his student days to rescue a political activist who was injected with lead by cultists in UNILAG. It was a legendary story of adventure and bravery.
Funso was a family pillar. He was a great husband to Enyonam and an admirable father to Yena and Ore. He, along with Enyonam, raised Yena and Ore to the admiration of quite a number of people. He has also been a great support to members of his extended family.
Funso also loved his football and kept a close circle of football followers as friends. He often said his bond with his father was built around watching football. Funso then indoctrinated Tunji – his younger brother into football early in life through BBC Sports Radio. Both of them had to wake up in the wee hours of the day to listen to BBC Radio. After enduring years of a trophyless run with Tottenham Hotspurs, he switched to Barcelona FC and enjoyed years of glory with the Catalans.
Funso’s sterling career commenced with a stint in entrepreneurship. Along with Emeka Onwuka and John Upah, Funso was a co-founder of Aquila Concepts, a media and sports promotion company. Aquila’s flagship product was a 90-minute documentary – “Eagles in Flight” featuring the Super Eagles of the 1990s. They also won the media rights for the Italian League in Nigeria in the 1990s. Funso would always rue how much he underrated his entrepreneurial skills and sought to re-enact this feat with the “Mama Ghana” brand, a pepper sauce consumer product he introduced into the Nigerian market.
Funso was a leftist who found himself in investment banking and believed that his humanitarian ideals can be pursued in the world of finance. He commenced his investment banking career with Citi Code and then Sectrust (now Afrinvest) where he was famed for working round the clock. He was poached by BGL to lead its research and strategy team. In BGL, Funso was renamed “RASTA” by the Managing Director for his leftist ideals and won admiration across the company for his leadership style which was evident in the way he built his team. He bonded with his team members well beyond the job. Funso integrated himself into the families of his team members and earned deep loyalties from them. He joined Synergy Capital as the Head of Advisory and was later appointed by the Board as the Managing Director.
Funso endeared himself to quite a number of friends and admirers with his charm. He was a good listener with a deep sense of humility. He loved to remain at the background where he got the job done and tried to give others extensive opportunities to win plaudits. He looked out for value in people and institutions and committed himself to unearth this value. He always sought to help friends and ex-colleagues in travail even at greater sacrifice to himself.
Funso is survived by his wife – Enyonam, two daughters, Yena and Ore, three siblings, Kemi, Tinu and Tunji and septuagenarian parents. He will be sorely missed.