[3][4] Andrija Nikolić (Serbian Cyrillic: Андрија Николић) was born in Serbia, at the time part of Yugoslavia, on 20 June 1961, and migrated to Australia with his family as a four-year-old.

[5] As a colonel, in 2003, Nikolic became the first commandant appointed to lead the Army Recruit Training Centre to have also graduated as a soldier.

In 2007, he was promoted to brigadier and appointed director general of public affairs, the principal spokesperson for the Department of Defence.

[7] Nikolic's overseas postings include service as: In addition to his Australian command responsibilities in Southern Iraq, he concurrently served as Chief of Staff of the British-led Multinational Division (South East).

He set up a website for his candidacy, and his campaigning activities in the Launceston area were reported in the media,[4][10] along with his confrontations with local environmentalists.

[17] In July 2013, in response to a complaint filed by Nikolic, the Australian Press Council found that The Sydney Morning Herald "failed to take reasonable steps to ensure accuracy and fairness" on some matters in its article on the subject.

[21] Nikolic was dropped as Government Whip on 20 September 2015 as a result of a ministerial reshuffle by the new prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, who had been elected during a leadership spill earlier that month.