November 5, 2021

Femi Osibona aka Femi Fourscore was the real estate developer and owner of the 21-story Tower which collapsed in Ikoyi, in highbrow Lagos. He died in that incident alongside scores of others who were either working at the site or visiting.

His story is a roller-coaster tale of a young man who once hawked shoes before transforming to a multi-millionaire Realtor; a true grass to grace life which mirrors the life of many African children.

Here are Quick Facts you must know about the man called Femi Fourscore:

He hails from Ikenne, Ogun State, where he attended Mayflower Secondary School in his town. He had HND certificate. He would later top it up with a Master’s degree in Business Administration from Croydon University in the UK.

He is an evangelist and a member of the Celestial Church of Christ (CCC) where he found solace after he was sacked from his job in London in 1987.

His company, Fourscore, owns a Mansion located at 113 Albion Drive London Fields, E8, 4LZ, East London and he is reputed to be the first black developer of African origin to undertake mega building projects in the UK.

He once sold shoes, shirts and ties and was so poor he could not afford to wear what he sold. Then he graduated to selling suits before fate thrust him into real estate.

He first built 12 apartments in London, sold eight and retained four. From the proceeds, he launched big into the real estate market overseas.

From London, he went to South Africa and built 125 houses in Centurion, near Johannesburg.

After the South Africa boom, he came to Nigeria, got a land in Ikoyi and built a Tower of 40 apartments. He sold each apartment for one million US dollars. He was such a man who could not be held back.

In Atlanta, United States, he had 24 flats but four of them caught fire. The money his Insurance firm paid him for the four flats was more than what he used to buy the whole 24 flats.

He would later sell the remaining 20 flats plus the money he got from insurance. That gave him another financial lease to aim higher.

The three Towers he was building in Ikoyi – 360 Degrees Towers – was an architectural signature he had wished to climax his hustle in Nigeria.

His body was retrieved from the rubble on Wednesday, November 3, barely 48 hours after the building on Gerrard Road, Ikoyi collapsed. Born in 1966, he died at 55.