The litigation is a civil records-disclosure dispute under FOIA. It does not constitute a criminal charge, trial, or judicial finding against President Tinubu.”
By Deborah Hassan
365Daily – The Presidency has clarified that the ongoing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) litigation involving President Bola Ahmed Tinubu before a United States District Court in Washington, D.C., is a civil records-disclosure dispute and not a criminal case against the Nigerian president.
The clarification came in a statement issued on Thursday by the Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, following what the Presidency described as speculative reports about the proceedings.
Onanuga said the litigation, filed in 2023 by Aaron Greenspan, concerns requests for records relating to Tinubu made to several US government agencies under the American FOIA.
According to the statement, the case followed FOIA requests submitted by Greenspan in 2022, after which some US agencies withheld certain records or declined to confirm or deny their existence.
The US District Court subsequently allowed Tinubu to participate in the case as an intervenor.
The Presidency recalled that the development came about 23 years after the US Consulate in Lagos, in a February 4, 2003 letter to the then Inspector General of Police, Tafa Balogun, stated that an FBI records check had found no criminal arrest records, wants or warrants for Tinubu, who was then governor of Lagos State.
Onanuga explained that during the FOIA proceedings, some US government agencies invoked what is known as the “Glomar defence”, a legal position under which an agency declines to confirm or deny the existence of certain records because doing so could reveal protected information about investigations, sources or law-enforcement techniques.
He said the court consequently granted summary judgment in favour of the CIA, Executive Office for United States Attorneys, Department of State, Department of the Treasury and Internal Revenue Service, removing them from the proceedings.
The remaining aspects of the case involve the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).
According to the Presidency, the FBI and DEA subsequently produced 399 pages of records, with portions redacted under exemptions provided by US law.
The plaintiff challenged the redactions and sought access to the documents in unredacted form.
The agencies, through the US Department of Justice, opposed the request, citing statutory exemptions covering grand jury proceedings, certain court orders, attorney-client and attorney-work-product privileges, law-enforcement records, personal privacy, confidential sources and investigative techniques.
The Presidency said Tinubu had also, on the advice of his lawyers, asserted his rights under FOIA’s personal privacy exemption.
“The release or withholding of records under FOIA does not, by itself, establish criminal liability,” Onanuga said, stressing that the case concerns “access to government records and the proper application of statutory exemptions.”
He said the plaintiff has until September 11, 2026, to file opposition and replies to processes filed by the defendants and the President, while the FBI, DEA and Tinubu have until September 18 to respond.
The Presidency also dismissed recent commentary suggesting that former Vice President Atiku Abubakar and his associate, Karl Von Batten, were central to the proceedings.
Onanuga said neither Atiku nor Von Batten was a party to the case, adding that the outcome would be determined by Judge Beryl A. Howell of the US District Court for the District of Columbia.
“The litigation is a civil records-disclosure dispute under FOIA. It does not constitute a criminal charge, trial, or judicial finding against President Tinubu,” the statement said.
The Presidency therefore urged the Nigerian media and the public to distinguish between the actual court proceedings and what it described as partisan or speculative commentary.