By Ezinwanne Onwuka
It’s no secret that the West African country of Nigeria is a fount of corruption: UK Prime Minister David Cameron once described the country as “fantastically corrupt.” Ex-president Muhummadu Buhari, in 2016, agreed.
Yet, the newly elected President of this largest, wealthiest and most corrupt nation in Africa appears to be on the verge of breaking new criminal ground. Since declaring his intention to run for the presidency and his eventual emergence as the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Nigeria’s 2023 general election, Bola Ahmed Tinubu has been involved in one career-shattering controversy after another.
He faced corruption accusations, which he outrightly denied, with questions during the campaign about his health, educational records, and the forfeiture of $460,000 to the United States government in 1993 over allegations of drug trafficking rearing their ugly heads, casting doubts on his suitability for the office of Nigeria’s first citizen.
But at the end of the day – despite the weighty efforts to strip him of credibility – he was declared the winner of the presidential election held on February 25, 2023. One would have thought that his victory would sweep the controversies under the carpet instead the opposition became fiercer.
Tinubu’s Education Scandal
The outcome of the last presidential election is being challenged in court by Tinubu’s major rivals, second-place Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and third-place Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP).
The rival candidates have several arguments for the nation’s Supreme Court to overturn Tinubu’s election in February, including vote rigging and his lack of qualification to run at all.
The latter argument is the focus of a firestorm of protests from the public regarding Tinubu’s educational records submitted to the electoral body, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to qualify for the 2023 presidential race.
Tinubu claimed he attended Chicago State University (CSU) in the US state of Illinois and tendered a certificate he said the university issued to him bearing June 22, 1979 and another bearing June 27, 1979, according to findings by Atiku’s counsel Angela Liu, who filed a petition in a US court seeking the release of all Tinubu’s records from the university.
The counsel also found that three of the school administrators signed one of the certificates and two different administrators signed the other. “It is clear that either ‘A’ or ‘B’ is fake (if not both). You cannot have two certificates issued by the same university, to the same person, for the same course of study, but issued on different dates and signed by two different sets of people,” Liu told the court.
In her argument, she said the two signatories of one of the certificates, Dr. Elnora D. Daniel and Dr. Niva Johnson-Lubin were not with the school in 1979. According to her, Dr. Daniel “was only President of CSU from 1998 to 2008. She was neither president of the university in 1979 – when the certificate was purportedly issued – nor was she president in 2022, when the replacement certificates were issued.”
She said of the latter, “Dr. Lubin-Johnson was the chairperson of the Board of Trustees of CSU from January 2001 to December 2002 only. Dr. Lubin-Johnson was neither a member of the Board of Trustees nor its Chairperson in 1979 – when the purportedly issued certificate – nor was she Chairperson in 2022, when the replacement certificate was purportedly issued.”
Other discrepancies Liu noted from the examination of the certificates include different letter fonts and logos. She further argued that though Tinubu’s certificates state that he graduated with a BSc in ‘Business and Administration’, a document from CSU states that he graduated with a BSc in ‘Business Administration’.
The certificate scandal against Bola Tinubu dates back to 1999 but he survived the scare. This time around, all legal authorities agree that if he lied about his academic record, he has to step down.
Nigeria’s apex court is expected to deliver its watershed ruling on Wednesday, September 6. Meanwhile, Tinubu blamed the university’s clerk for the errors in his certificates and requested that his academic record should not be released to Atiku.
Chicago State University in the eye of the storm
Nigerians, heartbroken by the turnout of events, have taken to social media to demand the release of Tinubu’s academic records. In their hundreds, they put out posts alleging the forgery of Tinubu’s certificate and the institution’s complicity in the matter.
“The Chicago State University is trying to hide something,” one post on X (formerly Twitter) by Malachy Odo reads, “I would understand if a Nigerian university is acting this funny but not an American university. What’s in it for them?”
CSU president Zaldwaynaka Scott, unable to contain the vitriolic attacks, deactivated her X account while the university locked its account on Monday, August 28, making its official X page accessible to only “confirmed followers”.
Amidst the goings-on, Scott, last month, got a mysterious $50,000 bonus – at a time when the institution is said to be struggling financially and faculty members are facing challenging working conditions. Nigerians by the millions are asking “Why, why, why?”
