The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has confirmed that Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu was the subject of a criminal investigation into drug-trafficking offences in the early 1990s, according to court documents filed in Washington.
The disclosure was made in a sworn declaration submitted on 28 August to the US District Court for the District of Columbia as part of an ongoing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit.
However, the filing does not state that Mr. Tinubu committed an offence, and he has never been convicted of any crime related to the probe.
The Nigerian presidency has dismissed the renewed focus on the documents as a “politically motivated” attempt by opposition figures to undermine the leader ahead of the country’s 2027 general election.
Freedom of information battle
In the declaration, the FBI noted that records being requested “were compiled in furtherance of the FBI’s investigation of multiple individuals for drug trafficking crimes.”
The bureau added that the court had already established an official acknowledgement of an investigation into Mr. Tinubu.
The submission follows an April 2025 ruling by US District Judge Beryl Howell, who determined that the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) could no longer use “Glomar” responses—a legal mechanism allowing agencies to neither confirm nor deny the existence of records—citing insufficient privacy grounds.
Judge Howell subsequently ordered the agencies to process non-exempt materials requested by American transparency advocate Aaron Greenspan.
Mr. Greenspan is seeking the full FBI file on Mr. Tinubu, including interview logs from 1992 and 1993 connected to a broader investigation into a Chicago-based heroin distribution network.
The FBI said it is continuing to withhold portions of the files to protect personal privacy, confidential sources, and law enforcement techniques.
Political row in Abuja
The release of the court declaration has sparked a fresh political dispute between the ruling administration and the opposition.
Portions of the filing were publicised by Von Batten-Montague-York, a Washington-based public relations and lobbying firm working for former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, Mr. Tinubu’s main rival in the 2023 election.
The firm stated on social media that it released the sworn statement to counter claims that the Nigerian president had never been under criminal investigation in the US.
The presidency reacted swiftly, accusing Mr. Abubakar’s camp of paying foreign lobbyists to manufacture controversy.
Sunday Dare, Special Adviser to the President on Media and Public Communications, called the campaign a “clinical demonstration of desperation.”
“The incendiary press releases being carefully churned out from Washington are public relations propaganda sheets passed off as the view of the US Government,” Mr. Dare said in a statement. “They are not.”
He added that public filings under the US Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) showed Mr. Abubakar had engaged the Washington firm on a $1.2m (£900,000) annual retainer to leverage decades-old legal records for political advantage.
Mr. Dare also stressed that if Mr. Tinubu had been criminally liable during the 1990s investigations, US authorities would have indicted him at the time.
Legal representatives for President Tinubu have maintained opposition to further disclosures, arguing that releasing private personal information from government archives violates his privacy rights.
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