President Bola Tinubu has asked a U.S. federal court to allow him additional time to respond to a legal application seeking the release of records concerning past allegations and investigations involving him.
Tinubu’s legal representatives filed a notice before the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, joining the U.S. Department of Justice and other defendants in requesting a 10-day extension to respond to a motion for summary judgment.
The filing, signed by attorneys Christopher W. Carmichael and Victor P. Henderson of Henderson Parks, LLC, asked that Tinubu’s response remain on the same timetable as that of the government defendants.
The case, Aaron Greenspan v. Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, et al., Civil Action No. 23-1816 (BAH), involves a Freedom of Information Act request for records relating to U.S. government investigations and allegations concerning Tinubu.
According to the filing, the plaintiff opposed the request for additional time, while the defendants did not object. U.S. District Judge Beryl Howell subsequently rejected the request for an extension.
The development has attracted political attention, particularly from Von Batten-Montague-York, a U.S.-based policy advisory and lobbying firm retained by former Vice President Atiku Abubakar. The firm published the court filing and later criticised Tinubu’s request in a post on X.
The firm alleged that the requested delay could provide Tinubu with additional time to engage U.S. officials and attempt to prevent the release of the records. It further suggested that arguments concerning U.S.-Nigeria relations and security cooperation could be raised to oppose disclosure.
Those claims, however, represent the lobbying firm’s allegations and should be distinguished from the contents of the court filing itself. The filing merely records Tinubu’s decision to join the defendants’ request for additional time.
The underlying case has been pending for more than three years and concerns records sought from U.S. government agencies under the Freedom of Information Act.
The controversy is connected to a long-running dispute over a $460,000 asset forfeiture involving funds held in an account associated with Tinubu. In 1993, a U.S. federal court ordered the money forfeited to the government, with the order describing the funds as proceeds of narcotics trafficking or as property involved in transactions that violated money-laundering laws.
The forfeiture has subsequently been cited in political arguments concerning Tinubu’s past. Tinubu, however, has repeatedly denied involvement in drug trafficking and has rejected any suggestion that the forfeiture amounted to a criminal conviction.
His legal representatives have maintained that the 1993 proceeding was a civil in rem forfeiture case directed at the money itself, rather than a criminal prosecution against Tinubu. They have also pointed out that he was not arrested, indicted, arraigned or convicted of a drug offence in the United States.
The latest court filing therefore concerns access to government records and the timetable for responding to a summary-judgment motion. It does not, by itself, establish the truth of the historical allegations contained in or surrounding those records.
The next stage of the litigation will determine how the court handles the request for disclosure of the records and whether the documents sought by the plaintiff will ultimately be released.