On July 15, 1951, Alakija was born into a middle-class family. Folorunso’s mother was the first of eight spouses and fifty-two children that her father, Chief L.A. Ogbara, had. Ikorodu, Lagos, is where she was born. Alakija left for school in the United Kingdom when she was ten years old. Alakija schooled at Shagamu, Nigeria’s Muslim High School. She then went back to England to study secretarial skills at London’s Pitman’s Central College.
