Certified True Copies Of Bola Tinubu’s Drug Dealing, Money Laundering Case In Chicago Released By US Court

The United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois has disclosed new records related to Bola Tinubu’s meeting with American authorities on drug trafficking and money laundering claims.

Mr Tinubu, the governing All Progressives Congress presidential candidate and former Lagos governor, has been under severe public and political scrutiny for his role in a narcotics trafficking case in Chicago in the early 1990s.

Mr Tinubu has been silent on the narcotics scandal, which has dominated headlines since at least the mid-aughts, choosing to focus on other aspects of his career in corporate accountancy, consulting, and pro-democracy advocacy. He did, however, state in his application to run for office with INEC that he had no past criminal convictions.

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Mr Tinubu’s friends have also attempted to dismiss the incident totally as a minor distraction to Nigeria’s democratic experience because it occurred decades ago in a foreign land.

However, Nigerians have asked that the presidential contender come clean about his involvement in the case, which resulted in him forfeiting up to $460,000 to US authorities in 1993.

The 56-page document provided by the district court’s headquarters in Chicago did not contain any significant new information, but it validated pieces of the case that had been circulated informally by the media for years. Following a July 13 report in West Africa Weekly, journalist David Hundeyin rekindled interest in Mr Tinubu’s drug-dealing past.

The most recent certified copy of the court case, received on August 10, revealed that Mr Tinubu and two others, K.O. Tinubu and Alhaji Mogati, were involved in the banking of illicit drug earnings and money laundering through Heritage Bank and Citibank. It was unclear whether ‘Alhaji Mogati’ was a misspelling of Mr Tinubu’s foster mother, Alhaja Abibatu Mogaji, who died in 2013.

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The United States authorities sought forfeiture of drugs revenues from Mr Tinubu in July 1993.
The dispute was settled by a settlement reached between Tinubus and US officials, with Tinubus being asked to keep the money in the Heritage Bank account while forfeiting the $460,000 in the Citibank account.

On September 21, 1993, a federal judge dismissed the case with prejudice, thereby barring all parties from litigating the case again. However, it was unclear whether Nigerian officials could still charge Mr Tinubu in Nigerian courts in connection with the same case.

Kalu Kalu Agu, an Abuja-based lawyer with ties to opposition parties, is among those seeking to hold Mr Tinubu accountable for the incident. He petitioned the EFCC and the NDLEA, Nigeria’s anti-graft and anti-narcotics agencies, to investigate Mr Tinubu’s involvement in the drug accusations before the February presidential elections.

Mr Kalu Agu ordered both departments seven days in the November 8 petition to take action against Mr Tinubu or be compelled through a judicial order of mandamus, a process that includes directing a public department to execute a public duty.

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“It is our view that you have a historic duty to ensure that Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu is called to account for his deeds in money laundering arising from his involvement in narcotics trafficking,” Mr Kalu Agu said from his think-tank Centre for Reform & Public Accountability in Abuja.

Mr Tinubu, who is on a campaign tour across the country, did not respond to a request for comment on the court documents published and Mr Kalu Agu’s petition to federal authorities. His campaign’s spokesman likewise declined to comment.

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