President Bola Tinubu on Monday begged a federal judge in the United States to ignore records that suggested the person who was admitted into Chicago State University in the 1970s was a female, saying his Nigerian political rival Atiku Abubakar was trying to sandbag him in the ongoing case over academic documents.
“It is established beyond peradventure that it is improper to sandbag one’s opponent by raising new matter in reply,” Mr Tinubu said in a September 11 filing before Judge Jeffrey Gilbert of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. One of Mr Tinubu’s lawyers in the case, Christopher Carmichael, entered today’s argument on the Nigerian president’s behalf.
The response seemed a last-minute push to downplay tomorrow’s hearing by Mr Gilbert, who had recommended that all parties appear before the court on Tuesday afternoon amid strong indications a ruling was imminent in the matter.
Abubakar was asking the court to grant enough subpoenas to compel records and depositions from CSU amid controversy Mr Tinubu’s admission and graduation.
The school has continued to present contradictory documents that often throw up more questions than previously conceived.
