At a People’s Democratic Party (PDP) meeting held on August 30, 2025, in northern Nigeria, former Jigawa State Governor Sule Lamido launched a blistering attack on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, accusing him of concealing his identity, forging academic credentials, and having ties to international drug investigations involving U.S. agencies like the FBI and CIA.
In a video posted on social media and sighted by NN News Media, speaking in Hausa to party members and supporters, Lamido began by welcoming attendees and declared, “Today, I will speak about an important issue.”
He continued:
“Nobody knows Tinubu’s history. Nobody knows his parents, his siblings, his relatives, or even his classmates. The only history known about him involves drug-related crimes investigated by the FBI and CIA.”
Lamido referenced long-standing controversies involving U.S. federal law enforcement, particularly the 1993 drug trafficking and money laundering case in which Tinubu forfeited over $460,000 to the U.S. government. Although no criminal conviction was issued, court documents filed in the Northern District of Illinois pointed to investigations linking Tinubu to narcotics-related financial transactions.
“The FBI even wanted to release his full case file, but it was blocked or delayed due to legal and diplomatic interference,” Lamido claimed, echoing recent calls by civil society groups demanding full transparency on Tinubu’s U.S. legal history.
Lamido also brought up the Chicago State University certificate scandal, stating:
“Even the certificate he submitted to INEC (Nigeria’s electoral commission) was fake. Chicago State University disowned parts of the documents Tinubu claimed to have gotten from them. So what do we know about this man, really?”
Indeed, in 2023 and 2024, Chicago State University confirmed that although Tinubu attended the school, the certificate he submitted to INEC as part of his presidential qualification did not originate from the institution’s records raising serious questions about forgery.
Lamido warned that this lack of transparency has dire consequences for the nation:
“We don’t know his origin. We don’t know his family’s origin. We know nothing about him except what is connected to crime and deceit. This is why Nigeria is in its current state.”
He concluded with a call for national reflection:
“We must think about this. We must seek the truth. May God help us all.”
NN News Media recall that the FBI, under pressure from U.S. Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, acknowledged possessing a case file on Bola Tinubu and indicated willingness to release documents, but the full file has not yet been made public due to pending legal review and diplomatic sensitivity.
