President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, through his lawyers, has urged the United States District Court for the District of Columbia to block the public release of his unredacted records with the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Drug Enforcement Administration.US District Court
In filings published on Saturday, the President argued that the US Freedom of Information Act and Privacy Act prevented the disclosure of the records, insisting that there was no public interest that justified their release.
Tinubu’s legal team also argued that the request was politically motivated and that the plaintiff, American transparency activist Aaron Greenspan, had ulterior motives for seeking documents containing the President’s name.
The lawyers further argued that the records were protected by privacy provisions under the FOIA and US Privacy Act, citing Exemption 7(C), which protects personal information contained in law-enforcement records.
“The asserted ‘public interest in Tinubu’s own fitness for office’ is not an interest FOIA recognises or one that needs to be balanced. The redacted information sought by the plaintiff is exempt from disclosure.”
Greenspan had requested the release of the records under the US FOIA, arguing that his request concerned the sitting President of Nigeria and the millions of Nigerians whose lives are affected by Tinubu’s decisions.
However, Tinubu’s lawyers rejected the argument that Nigerians’ interest in the President’s background constituted a public interest recognised under US law. They maintained that FOIA was intended to provide information about government activities rather than private citizens.
The legal team also cited a 1989 US Supreme Court ruling to support its position, arguing that releasing the requested records would reveal little or nothing about the conduct of government agencies.
The development has renewed political debate in Nigeria, with opposition figures insisting that Nigerians deserve greater transparency about the President’s background.
