Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has moved to block a request for further documents pertaining to him in a US federal court case.
His lawyers have argued that the information pertains to his personal life before he became a politician and is protected by USA’s privacy laws.
In their August 28, 2026, filing, Tinubu’s attorneys requested the court to deny Aaron Greenspan’s motion for summary judgment and to direct the FBI and DEA to continue withholding the records.
The President sought to intervene in the case regarding the records of federal authorities over the Freedom of Information Act. Recently, Greenspan has been asking for documents related to the FBI and other US agencies’ investigations into President Tinubu that happened in the early 90s.
Tinubu’s lawyers have argued that the information sought pertained to “records of a private individual,” and not the “functional records” of the US government. They further claimed that most of it was exempt from disclosure by the Freedom of Information Act’s exemption 7(C) which covers “law enforcement” files.
They added that the Privacy Act also applied to the documents, and the President had an interest in maintaining the confidentiality of documents about his life before he became a politician.
The Court ordered in 2025 for the FBI and DEA to look for any non-exempt materials for the FOIA. It is yet to determine the truth of the allegations made against Tinubu years ago.
The current case therefore revolves around which documents the Government can legally release to the public and which ones it can keep secret.
