The United States Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) has asked a federal court to allow it to submit confidential explanations for withholding some records relating to past investigations involving President Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
The FBI made the request in an application filed on August 20, 2026, before the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, as part of an ongoing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit seeking records connected to investigations involving Tinubu.
The agency asked the court to permit it to submit an ex parte, in camera declaration, meaning the document would be presented privately to the judge and kept outside the public record.
The FBI said it had invoked several exemptions under the US Freedom of Information Act in response to requests for records relating to Tinubu from 1992 to 1993. It argued that releasing some of the withheld information could disclose law-enforcement investigative techniques and potentially endanger the life or physical safety of an individual.
One of the requests, according to the FBI, sought the entire FBI file for Tinubu, while another requested FBI 302 interview records involving him in connection with an FBI case during the 1992–1993 period.
The agency said it could not publicly provide the full basis for its reliance on certain FOIA exemptions and therefore required a confidential declaration to explain its position to the court.
The FBI said that, if the court approves the request, it would submit the declaration explaining the reasons for the withheld information before August 28, 2026.
The case was brought by Aaron Greenspan, an American businessman and founder of PlainSite, who has filed multiple FOIA requests seeking records from US government agencies concerning investigations into a Chicago heroin ring that operated in the early 1990s.
Between 2022 and 2023, Greenspan filed 12 FOIA requests with six US federal agencies seeking records concerning four individuals he said were linked to the investigation, including Tinubu, Lee Andrew Edwards, Mueez Adegboyega Akande and Abiodun Agbele.
The FBI and other agencies previously issued what is known as a Glomar response, under which an agency refuses to confirm or deny whether requested records exist.
However, in April 2025, US District Judge Beryl Howell ruled that the FBI and Drug Enforcement Administration had improperly relied on Glomar responses and ordered them to process non-exempt records responsive to the requests.
The latest application comes amid further legal proceedings over the release of the records. The US Department of Justice had previously sought additional time to respond to the court’s order, but Judge Howell granted only a limited extension and set August 21, 2026, as the deadline for the government and Tinubu to respond.
Tinubu has not been convicted of drug trafficking in the United States. The FOIA case concerns access to government records and does not itself establish that the Nigerian President committed a drug-trafficking offence.
