Nigerian bloggers will mock me if Chicago university releases my certificate – Tinubu tells U.S. court

President Bola Tinubu has filed a request with a U.S. court, seeking protection from media exposure by keeping his records from Chicago State University (CSU) confidential. In recent court filings, Tinubu argued that the disclosure of his CSU records could jeopardize his reputation as the Nigerian president.

Tinubu is actively opposing an application aiming to release his CSU credentials, asserting that making them public would furnish Nigerian bloggers with ammunition to tarnish his reputation and undermine his authority.

Tinubu’s legal team, led by Oluwole Afolabi and Chicago-based Charles Carmichael, issued a response on August 23 to the application submitted by Atiku Abubakar, a significant contender in Nigeria’s February 25 presidential election. In the response, Tinubu’s lawyers highlighted the notion of “opposition research” in politics, which involves gathering information to discredit opponents.

Abubakar had petitioned the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois to subpoena CSU for Tinubu’s records, aiming to address inconsistencies in details like gender, graduation date, and age. However, Tinubu is vigorously opposing the application.

In a previous response to a subpoena in 2022, CSU provided records that indicated a Bola Tinubu, born on March 29, 1954, who attended the school during the same period as Tinubu’s claimed attendance in the 1970s, was listed as female. Tinubu recently removed details of his primary and secondary education from his records after it was revealed that the schools he mentioned under oath in his 1999 Lagos governorship run did not exist in Nigeria.

Abubakar sought the requested records to clarify which educational documents Tinubu submitted to CSU prior to admission. CSU’s response was initially disclosed on journalist David Hundeyin’s website in 2022, subsequently gaining traction on various platforms, including Twitter, where the gender controversy ignited discussions about Tinubu’s eligibility for the presidency and raised questions of perjury.

President Tinubu’s legal team expressed concerns about the potential repercussions of releasing the records to Abubakar, given their past experience with the documents being used against Tinubu’s character. They emphasized the utilization of the records by bloggers and a self-proclaimed Nigerian “public interest litigator” to attack Tinubu’s reputation.

The legal proceedings center on the subpoena issued to CSU to verify Tinubu’s educational claims. Tinubu’s lawyers are determined to safeguard their client’s character amid media scrutiny and potential repercussions.