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President Bola Tinubu has joined the United States Department of Justice in requesting a 10-day extension to respond to a court motion seeking the release of records related to longstanding drug trafficking allegations against him.
Tinubu's legal team filed a notice of joinder before the US District Court for the District of Columbia, asking that its response be aligned with the timetable requested by the defendants in the case.
The filing, signed by Christopher W. Carmichael and Victor P. Henderson of Henderson Parks, LLC, stated that the President was joining the defendants' application for additional time to respond to the plaintiff's motion for summary judgment.
According to the filing, the plaintiff opposed the request, while the defendants did not object. However, US District Judge Beryl Howell reportedly declined the application for the extension.
The court filing was published by Von Batten-Montague-York, L.C., a US-based policy advisory and lobbying firm retained by former Vice President Atiku Abubakar.
In a post on X, the lobbying firm alleged that the requested delay could provide Tinubu with additional time to lobby US officials over the release of the documents. It also suggested the records could become part of broader discussions on US-Nigeria relations and security cooperation.
The case, Aaron Greenspan v. Executive Office for U.S. Attorneys, et al. (Civil Action No. 23-1816), seeks the release of records relating to US investigations and allegations linking Tinubu to suspected drug trafficking activities.
The matter has drawn attention because of a 1993 civil forfeiture case in which a US District Court ordered the forfeiture of $460,000 held in an account bearing Tinubu's name. Court records stated that the funds represented proceeds of narcotics trafficking or were involved in transactions that violated US money laundering laws.
Tinubu has consistently denied any involvement in drug trafficking. His lawyers have maintained that the forfeiture was an in rem civil action against the funds rather than a criminal case against him.
They have also argued that the President was never arrested, indicted, arraigned or convicted of any drug-related offence in the United States.
