Victor EzejaAgainst expectations, the United States’ Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) have requested a 90-day extension to produce records on an alleged drug investigation involving Nigeria’s President Bola Tinubu.
The documents were to be released on Friday, 02 May 2025, in line with an order given in April by Judge Beryl Howell of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia.
Join our WhatsApp ChannelHowever, FBI and DEA filed a joint status report in the court on Thursday, 1 May, seeking a 90-day extension to produce the documents.
The case is based on a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit filed by US transparency activist, Aaron Greenspan, in June 2023.
The suit requested access to investigative records from various federal agencies in the United States concerning a drug trafficking and money laundering case in Chicago in the 1990s that was allegedly linked to Tinubu and other individuals.
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Greenspan, according to court papers, filed 12 separate FOIA requests between 2022 and 2023 to the FBI, DEA, Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the U.S. Department of State, U.S. Attorneys’ Offices in Indiana and Illinois, and the CIA. The requests centered on gathering information about four people: Bola Tinubu, Mueez Akande, Lee Andrew Edwards, and Abiodun Agbele, all of whom are alleged members of the drug network.
However, in their filing on Thursday, the FBI and the DEA stated that they required further time to finish their investigations.
In their joint status filed with the court, the two agencies said: “Pursuant to the court’s order, the defendants, FBI and DEA must search for and produce non-exempt records responsive to the plaintiff’s FOIA requests (FBI Requests Nos. 1588244–000 and 1593615- 000, and DEA Request Nos. 22–00892-F and 24–00201-F).
READ ALSO: Why U.S. Court Ordered Release Of Records On Tinubu’s Drug Link Probe
“The FBI and DEA have initiated their searches for responsive, non-exempt, reasonably segregable portions of records requested by the plaintiff and anticipate completing their searches in ninety days.”
Greenspan, who expressed great displeasure over the delay in releasing the records, called on FBI and DEA to conclude and release the documents latest next week.
“Given the years-long delay already caused by the defendants and the fact that many responsive documents have already been identified, the plaintiff proposes that the FBI and DEA complete their searches and productions by next week, or, at the very least, produce unredacted versions of the already-identified documents by next week, with the remainder completed in 14 days. The defendants provide no rationale for why their search for documents should take 90 days.
“The FBI and DEA have initiated their searches for responsive, non-exempt, reasonably segregable portions of records requested by the plaintiff and anticipate completing their searches in ninety days,” Greenspan said.
Victor Ezeja is a passionate journalist with seven years of experience writing on economy, politics and energy. He holds a Master's degree in Mass Communication.
