A US Federal Judge has postponed his decision on whether to grant a subpoena for the academic records of Nigerian President Bola Tinubu, who is facing a lawsuit over his eligibility to run for office.
The judge said he was puzzled by the fact that Tinubu’s college transcript, which he used to enroll at Chicago State University (CSU) in 1977, indicated that it belonged to a female student.
The lawsuit was filed by former Nigerian Vice President Atiku Abubakar, who challenged Tinubu’s victory in the 2023 presidential election. Abubakar alleged that Tinubu falsified his educational qualifications and did not meet the constitutional requirement of having at least a secondary school certificate.
Abubakar’s lawyer, Alexandre de Gramont, sought a subpoena from the US District Court for the Northern District to compel CSU to produce Tinubu’s records, including his admission application, transcript, diploma and graduation ceremony program.
However, Tinubu’s lawyer, Christopher Carmichael, opposed the subpoena, arguing that it was based on a conspiracy theory propagated by Tinubu’s political enemies in Nigeria. He likened it to the “birther” movement that questioned former US President Barack Obama’s citizenship.
“It is like Donald Trump coming up in 2010 to claim that Barack Obama was not born in the United States,” Carmichael said.
He also pointed out that there was a discrepancy between the transcript that Tinubu submitted to CSU and the one that the school released to a Nigerian civil rights lawyer, Mike Enahoro-Ebah, under a separate state court subpoena in 2022.
The transcript that Tinubu submitted showed that he had attended Southwest College Chicago and that he was male. The transcript that CSU released showed that the owner of the transcript was female.
Carmichael said that this proved that the transcript was not Tinubu’s and that someone else had used his name to attend Southwest College Chicago.
De Gramont countered that the gender issue was not a trivial matter, but rather a serious indication of fraud. He said that Tinubu had never explained why his transcript had a female marker and that he had never produced any other evidence of his education.
He also noted that CSU’s lawyer, Michael Hayes, had admitted that the school could not verify the authenticity of Tinubu’s diploma or confirm that he was the one who graduated from the school.
“Is the diploma authentic or is it a forgery? My client can’t answer yes to either of those questions,” Hayes said.
The judge, Jeffrey Gilbert, said he was confused by the conflicting records and statements from both parties. He said he needed more time to review the documents and possibly request additional information from CSU or other sources.
“I will have to take this matter under advisement,” the judge said. He added that his court would notify the lawyers of a new date for his ruling or hearing.
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