A United States District Court in Washington, D.C., has ordered the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) to release documents related to the criminal investigation of Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu over alleged drug trafficking activities.
The ruling, delivered by Judge Beryl Howell on April 8, 2025, followed a lawsuit filed by American legal researcher Aaron Greenspan, founder of the legal transparency platform PlainSite. Greenspan had submitted multiple Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests between 2022 and 2023, demanding access to records concerning a Chicago drug cartel that operated in the early 1990s.
His FOIA requests specifically mentioned Bola Tinubu, Lee Andrew Edwards, Mueez Abegboyega Akande, and Abiodun Agbele.
Initially, the FBI and DEA responded with a “Glomar response,” refusing to confirm or deny the existence of the requested files. However, the court ruled this approach invalid in this particular case.
According to the court’s decision, the FBI and DEA must now search and process all non-exempt records related to Tinubu and the drug investigation. The judge emphasized that public interest outweighs any privacy claims in this case, stating that both agencies failed to justify keeping the information secret.
The ruling declared:
“The FBI and DEA have both officially confirmed investigations of Tinubu relating to the drug trafficking ring… Any privacy interests are outweighed by the public’s right to know.”
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While the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) also issued a Glomar response, the court upheld it after Greenspan acknowledged the CIA’s compliance under the FOIA law.
The court has directed the FBI and DEA to provide a status update by May 2, 2025, as they release the non-exempt documents.
This landmark ruling could potentially shed more light on Tinubu’s past involvement in alleged drug crimes in the United States, a matter of growing public concern in Nigeria.
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