President Bola Tinubu has requested that the Federal Bureau of Investigation, Central Intelligence Agency, and other US agencies block records related to him from being disclosed. Christopher Carmichael, a lawyer representing Tinubu in the academic record case, filed motions to appear in an ongoing freedom of information action against U.S. organizations where records that may help answer questions about the president’s real identity and decades-long endeavors are domiciled. The FBI plans to release the record before the end of October to Aaron Greenspan, the proprietor of PlainSite, a website that pushes anti-corruption and transparency in public service.
Several U.S. institutions, including the U.S. State Department, Internal Revenue Service, and Drug Enforcement Administration, have indicated readiness to turn over thousands of pages of records related to Tinubu. Tinubu recently lost an emergency appeal to the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois in Chicago to stop Chicago State University from releasing his academic records to Atiku Abubakar, his opponent in the 2023 presidential election. Judge Nancy L. Maldonado overruled Tinubu’s objections to Magistrate Judge Gilbert’s recommended ruling, adopting the ruling in full.
Atiku Abubakar challenged the validity of President Tinubu’s election in Nigerian courts on several grounds, including a claim that President Tinubu submitted a forged diploma to the Nigerian Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) stating that he graduated from CSU. He seeks records and testimony from CSU related to President Tinubu’s diploma and graduation from CSU to support his challenge to the election results.
