UPDATED: US court orders CSU to release Tinubu’s records sought by Atiku to press case
By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
Chicago State University (CSU) has been ordered by the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois to release within two days the biodata and academic records of President Bola Tinubu.
The court also ordered a deposition of a designated CSU official within two days after the records have been released, ruling the process can be conducted during the weekend if necessary.
Arise News reported this morning Judge Jeffrey Gilbert gave the ruling on Tuesday in the lawsuit filed by Atiku Abubakar to prove his allegation Tinubu used the diploma transcript of a female Bola A. Tinubu to gain admission to CSU and/or to forge the degree certificate of the female which male Tinubu claimed to be his own.
SaharaReporters adds the court ordered all relevant records pertaining to Tinubu’s admission and time at CSU be released to Atiku, saying the applicant had sufficiently satisfied the purpose for seeking the records.
“For all of the reasons discussed above, Atiku Abubakar’s application pursuant to 28 U.S.C. § 1782 for an order directing discovery from Chicago State University for use in a foreign proceeding [ECF No. 1] is granted,” Gilbert ruled.
“Respondent CSU shall produce all relevant and non-privileged documents in response to requests for production Nos. 1 through 4 (as narrowed by the court) in applicant subpoena within two days of the entry of this memorandum opinion and order.
“The deposition of respondent’s corporate designee shall proceed within two days of the production of documents. The parties can modify the dates set by the court by mutual agreement.
“Given the tight time frame under which the parties are operating, the deposition can, if necessary, occur on a non-weekday.”
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CSU confirms admission transcript belongs to a ‘female’
CSU had previously confirmed in the court the transcript with which male Tinubu got admission in the school in 1977 belongs to a “female” whose name appears in the document as “Bola A. Tinubu”.
The diploma transcript was issued by Southwest College Chicago, CSU lawyer Michael Hayes told the court, citing and confirming CSU records earlier released through attorney subpoena to Nigerian civil rights lawyer Mike Enahoro-Ebah.
Hayes was making his argument in the application filed by Atiku for a subpoena to obtain directly from CSU the academic records of Tinubu to support allegation he committed identity theft, age falsification, certificate forgery, and perjury, all of which disqualify him from the office of President.
Section 137 (1)(j) of the Nigerian Constitution (amended in 2010) says, “A person shall not be qualified for election to the office of president if … he has presented a forged certificate to the Independent National Electoral Commission [INEC].”
The Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC) in its judgment in Abuja on September 6 rejected Tinubu’s CSU particulars Atiku presented through Enahoro-Ebah, his witness, partly on the grounds the witness was not competent.
Atiku has appealed to the Supreme Court.
In the US court, Hayes confirmed before Gilbert that CSU indeed turned in the records to Enahoro-Ebah in 2022, but insisted Tinubu, the Nigerian President, was the one who attended and graduated from the school in 1979.
Hayes, however, said he could not explain the contradictions in the records.
“Is the diploma authentic or is it a forgery? My client can’t answer yes to either of those questions,” he told the court.
The Judge said he wanted to rule on the matter when he scheduled a hearing for September 12 but needed more time to digest his decision after learning that there is a transcript bearing “Bola A. Tinubu” released by CSU under a separate subpoena that states the owner’s gender as female.
The gender issue was raised by Tinubu’s lawyer, Christopher Carmichael, who tried to use it to demonstrate the frivolity of the case before the court, dismissing it as a fishing expedition based on a conspiracy theory peddled in Nigeria by Tinubu’s political detractors.
“It is like Donald Trump coming up in 2010 to claim that Barack Obama was not born in the United States,” Carmichael said.
But Atiku’s lawyer Alexandre de Gramont quickly informed the court the possibility of “Bola A. Tinubu”, who attended CSU in the same 1970s, being a woman was first revealed in records CSU itself released in 2022 based on the previous subpoena.
Gilbert said he would need additional time to process the confusion, especially given Hayes’ confirmation of the records released last year by CSU.
“I will have to take this matter under advisement,” the Judge announcing, adding his court would communicate a new judgment or hearing date with counsel to all parties.
He said additional documents or clarification about already submitted documents may be required from the parties.
Gilbert’s docket was updated at night on September 12, hours after the ruling, and also confirmed the matter is “taken under advisement for the reasons stated on the record.”
The Judge had stressed earlier in the hearing the court has always taken a liberal and broad view in granting similar requests under Section 1782.
The statute allows the release of documents and evidence domiciled in the US to be obtained and used in a foreign proceeding, especially with countries that have legal reciprocity arrangements with the US like Nigeria.
Forgery allegation in two parts
Filings at the PEPC in Abuja and in the US court show Tinubu’s CSU records presented in both courts have the same details.
The allegation of certificate forgery against him is in two parts:
Part one – ‘Bola A. Tinubu’ is a ‘female’
Subpoenaed CSU documents show, among others, that one “Bola A. Tinubu”, a “female”,
- Who was born on 29 March 1954,
- Attended Southwest College in Chicago after attending Government College, Lagos.
- She obtained a diploma from Southwest College with which she was admitted to CSU in 1977, and graduated with a BSc degree in “business administration” in 1979.
- The degree certificate CSU issued to her was dated 27 June 1979.
However, Atiku argued President Bola Tinubu filled in the forms he submitted to the INEC in 1999 and 2022 that, he, a “man”,
- Was born on 29 March 1952.
- Attended Government College, Ibadan (in 1999 INEC forms).
- Declined to state his primary and secondary schools (in 2022 INEC form)
- Attended CSU where he graduated with a BSc degree in “business and administration” in 1979.
- His CSU degree certificate was dated 22 June 1979.
Atiku insisted these and other discrepancies in Tinubu’s records show his degree certificate was allegedly forged by engaging in identity theft to counterfeit and claim the school records of the original “Bola A. Tinubu”, who is a female.
Atiku has asked the US court to expedite the subpoena of Tinubu’s CSU records to clear the inconsistencies in Tinubu’s particulars he needs to buttress his case at the Supreme Court of Nigeria in his appeal against the judgment of the PEPC.
Part two – Tinubu presented two different CSU certificates
Angela Liu, another lawyer for Atiku, told the US court in August that Tinubu presented two contradictory CSU certificates signed by different persons and “BOTH certificates may well be fake.”
Liu pointed out the discrepancies in response to a submission by Tinubu’s lawyers, saying one certificate was issued on 22 June 1979 and the other on 27 June 1979 signed by “two different sets of people.”
Tinubu blamed “clerical error” for the discrepancies in his certificate, insisting an unidentified CSU clerk made the error about the date the school stated on his recently re-issued certificate, creating “the appearance of differences”.
However, Liu clarified that one certificate asserts that Tinubu was issued the certificate on 22 June 1979 and another asserts the certificate was issued on 27 June 1979, with the certificates bearing different CSU letter fonts and logos.
Her words: “The document marked ‘A’ is the certificate submitted by Tinubu to INEC. This certificate is, in every material respect, exactly the same as the document marked ‘B’ except for the following.
“Document ‘A’ is signed by at least three people whereas ‘B’ is signed by only two people.
“The document marked ‘E’ states that Tinubu was issued a certificate on 22nd June 1979 but then proceeded to forward a copy of a certificate (‘B’) dated 27th June 1979.
“Please note that ‘A’ is actually dated 22nd June 1979, but this document did not emanate from CSU. Only ‘B’ did.
“You cannot have two certificates issued by the same university, to the same person, for the same course of study, but issued on different dates and signed by two different sets of people.
“The documents ‘A’ and ‘B’ both state that Tinubu graduated with a BSc in ‘Business AND Administration’, whereas document ‘E’ (which came from CSU) states that he graduated with a BSc in ‘Business Administration’.”
Liu said the CSU website makes no reference to “business and administration” and only says the College of Business offers a contemporary business program leading to a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration or Masters in Business Administration (MBA).
She also argued it was not possible for Elnora D. Daniel to be among those who signed both of Tinubu’s certificates because she was only CSU President between 1998 and 2008.
“She was neither President of the university in 1979 – when the certificate was purportedly issued – nor was she President in 2022, when the replacement certificates were issued.”
