Aaron Greenspan, owner of PlainSite, a website that advocates data transparency to combat corruption in public service, has labelled President Bola Tinubu an “alleged criminal” using delay tactics to pause the release of his records by U.S. security agencies including the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Central Intelligence Agency (CIA).
“Bola Ahmed Tinubu is an alleged criminal trying to buy time in a desperate attempt to cling to power in Nigeria, which the FOIA materials in this action directly threaten,” Mr Greenspan told the U.S. Court for the Northern District of Columbia in Washington D.C. on Monday.
Mr Greenspan, on Monday, told a U.S. Court that the Nigerian president’s last-ditch effort to intervene in the five-month-old lawsuit was merely an attempt to buy time and stop his rivals from using the records against him at Nigeria’s Supreme Court where his election victory is being hotly contested.
The PlainSite owner worked closely with journalist David Hundeyin to submit a freedom of information request for Mr Tinubu’s records since 2022, which the FBI is now set to release in October.
His response came shortly after Mr Tinubu filed a motion to intervene in the suit claiming he would be “adversely affected” if the court denied his intervention request.
But Mr Greenspan said he could see through Mr Tinubu’s foot-dragging antics to fool the U.S. court into delaying the release of his records because he knew the documents could bungle his case at the apex court in Nigeria.
“To call Tinubu’s motion a last-ditch attempt at buying time is an understatement. This action has been pending in open court for approximately five months. Its filing was covered in Nigerian media,” asserted Mr Greenspan in his opposition to the Nigerian leader’s request.
“The timing of Tinubu’s submission is suspicious given the Nigerian Supreme Court’s simultaneous proceedings and should be treated as meritless accordingly,” he added.
Mr Tinubu has yet to recover from the legal blow he was dealt by the U.S. Court for the Northern District of Illinois in Chicago after judges Nancy Maldonado and Jeffrey Gilbert ordered Chicago State University (CSU) to give his main opponent, Atiku Abubakar, access to all educational records and depose registrar Caleb Westberg.
Mr Westberg, in his October 3 deposition, said he could not authenticate the certificate Mr Tinubu tendered to Nigeria’s electoral commission, INEC, because the school did not issue the document.
The Nigerian leader is fighting desperately to prevent the Supreme Court from admitting the deposition as evidence and may not be able to endure the backlash of his records — criminal or otherwise — being in the public domain.
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