Rotimi Adebari, a Nigerian-born Irish politician, is elected the Mayor of Portlaoise Town Council on June 27, 2007, becoming the first black mayor elected in Ireland.

Adebari is born 1964 in Okeodan, Ogun State, and studies economics at the University of Benin in Benin City, Edo State, Nigeria.

Adebari arrives in Dublin with his wife and two children in 2000. After he converts from Islam to Christianity, he flees Nigeria in 2000, and makes a claim for asylum on the grounds of religious persecution. His application is rejected because of a lack of evidence that he had personally suffered persecution. He does however gain automatic residency when his wife gives birth to a son in Ireland shortly after their arrival.

Adebari and his family settle in County Laois. He completes his master’s degree in intercultural studies at Dublin City University (DCU) and sets up a firm called Optimum Point Consultancy.

In 2004, Adebari is elected as a town councilor in local elections. On June 27, 2007, at the age of 43, he is elected mayor of the 9-member Portlaoise Town Council, by a vote of six to three and with support from Fine Gael, Sinn Féin and an Independent councilor. At a meeting attended by officials from the Nigerian, South African, and the United States embassies, the new mayor is quoted as saying his election is proof that “Ireland is not just a country of a thousand welcomes, but it is a country of equal opportunity.” In the 2009 local elections he is re-elected to the town council and also to Laois County Council for the Portlaoise electoral area.

In 2007, Adebari denies claims that he was a train operator in London who worked out of the Queen’s Park station on the Bakerloo line. Multiple London Underground employees, including Paddy Clarke, a retired tube driver from County Louth, state that Adebari worked as a train driver in London during the late 1990s before moving to Ireland. Clarke states, “at the very least fifty drivers and six or more managers will remember him. His photograph and signature are on file with London Underground’s personnel office which were used in the issue of his free travel-pass and identity card.” Adebari asserts he traveled to Ireland directly from Nigeria via Paris, and never worked or lived in London at any time.

Adebari runs as an independent candidate in the 2011 Irish general election for the Laois–Offaly constituency. He fails to get elected and receives 628 first-preference votes (0.85%). He runs as an Independent in the 2014 Irish Local Elections but fails to gain election and loses his position on Laois County Council.