Tinubu/Chicago: US Court Has Done What Nigerian Judiciary Could Not Do For 23 Years-Shaibu

An aide to former Vice-President Atiku Abubakar, Monday, said his principal would not have gotten justice had his suit for the release of the degree of President Bola Tinubu had been entertained in a Nigerian court.

Phrank Shaibu disclosed this in a reaction to the ruling of Justice Nancy Maldonado which ordered Chicago State University to make available all Tinubu’s academic records to Atiku.

Atiku is the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Nigeria’s 2023 general election. The Independent National Election Commission, headed by professor Mahmood Yakubu, had declared the candidate of All Progressives Congress, Mr Bola Tinubu, winner of the election.

Atiku, among other issues, is challenging the authenticity of Tinubu’s degree. The pursuit led to a legal battle at the Northern District of Illinois Court, which ruled in favour of Atiku in a case Tinubu opposed.

According to Shaibu, the independence of the United States of America judiciary led to President Bola Tinubu’s frustration and his eventual failure to use the instrument of the law to stop Atiku from having access to his documents in the custody of the university.

Shaibu added that Tinubu had, since 1999 evaded justice when the late human rights lawyer, Gani Fawehinmi (SAN), originally challenged the genuiness of Tinubu’s academic qualifications.

He berated Nigerian judges for allegedly failing to respect the sanctity of the constitution by delivering election judgements in suits partaining to Tinubu on merit.

He said the judges’ biasness makes them seek technicalities, leading to Tinubu’s twenty controversial election case victories.

According to him, “Justice Maldonado, who has spent less than one year on the bench and who sat on this case for barely a month, has been able to do what the Nigerian judiciary could not do for 23 years.

“This explains why the Nigerian society is on the brink of slipping into the state of nature, which Thomas Hobbes described as ‘short, brutish, and nasty’.”

Former aviation minister Osita Chidoka had yesterday berated the judiciary, INEC, State Security Services, and the National Intelligence Agency for being unable to scrutinise Tinubu’s academic qualifications. He described Tinubu’s efforts to stop the disclosure of his academic records in a US court as a ‘national tragedy’.