The Epstein Files Opened. The Tinubu Files Stay Sealed. Here Is the Real Reason Why.
The Epstein files were released, and the Tinubu files remain sealed for reasons of law, death, and political will, not because of a CIA cover-up. No evidence supports the claim that President Bola Tinubu is or was a CIA asset. No legal pathway exists for his arrest or criminal trial in the United States on the 1993 Chicago matter. The real story is what continued secrecy does to public trust in Nigeria ahead of the 2027 elections.
Three questions dominate Nigerian conversations about the American court records connected to President Tinubu. If Washington could open the Jeffrey Epstein files, why not the Tinubu files? Is the president a CIA asset protected by his handlers? Could he face arrest in the United States like Venezuela's captured former president, Nicolas Maduro? Each question sounds reasonable. Each one dissolves under legal scrutiny. In a perception war, the difference between fact and speculation is the difference between informed citizenship and manipulated opinion.
What the Record Actually Shows
The verified facts are narrower than the rumors. In 1993, the United States Department of Justice filed a civil forfeiture action in Chicago after investigators linked funds in bank accounts associated with Tinubu to the proceeds of a heroin trafficking network operated by Adegboyega Mueez Akande and Abiodun Agbele. Under a settlement order signed by Judge John A. Nordberg on September 15, 1993, Tinubu forfeited 460,000 dollars to the US government. He was never criminally charged, indicted, or convicted. He has consistently denied any wrongdoing, and Nigeria's Court of Appeal ruled in 2023 that a civil forfeiture targets property, not the person, and does not prove a crime.
The current fight is a records case, not a criminal case. American transparency activist Aaron Greenspan sued six US agencies in 2023 after they refused to confirm or deny that files on the old investigation existed. In April 2025, Judge Beryl Howell ruled that the FBI and DEA could no longer hide behind that refusal and ordered them to process the records. The agencies have since released thousands of pages with heavy redactions, and Tinubu joined the case personally to keep those redactions in place on privacy grounds. On August 28, 2026, the FBI handed the underlying 1993 investigative records to Judge Howell under seal for her private review. She, not the public, will now see what the file contains.
"The current fight is a records case, not a criminal case. The most it can produce is paper, never a prosecution."
Why Epstein's Files Opened, and Tinubu's Did Not
The Epstein comparison is emotionally powerful and legally weak. The Epstein files did not emerge through the normal records process. Congress passed a specific law, the Epstein Files Transparency Act, by a House vote of 427 to 1, and the president signed it in November 2025. The Justice Department has since published nearly 3.5 million pages under that statutory command. That was raw political will, driven by years of public fury over a dead, convicted sex offender.
Every element of that formula is missing here. Epstein is deceased, and under American records law, death sharply reduces a person's privacy interest. Tinubu is alive, is a sitting head of state, and was never charged with a crime, which places him near the strongest privacy position the law recognizes. No American constituency is demanding a Tinubu transparency law. The files are also law enforcement records, not classified intelligence, so the popular word "declassify" does not even apply. The barrier is legal doctrine and political indifference in Washington, not a hidden hand.
The CIA Asset Theory Fails the Evidence Test
The theory runs like this: the CIA refused to confirm or deny it holds records on Tinubu, the court let that refusal stand, therefore he must be an agency asset. The logic fails at every step. The CIA issues the same non-answer about virtually any named foreign individual, because confirming or denying either way would reveal where American intelligence interests do or do not exist. Courts uphold this practice routinely. The agency would have given an identical response about a randomly chosen Lagos trader.
The litigation record points in the opposite direction. The party fighting hardest to keep the records sealed is not the American intelligence community asserting national security. It is Tinubu's own legal team asserting personal privacy. If Washington were shielding a former asset, we would expect government secrecy claims, not a privacy motion filed by the subject himself. Similar folklore surrounds the late Chief MKO Abiola, said in popular retelling to have carried a CIA code name, and Chief Olusegun Obasanjo. OSRS has found no credible declassified document supporting any of these claims. Until such a document surfaces, honest analysts must label all of them what they are: unverified speculation.
"Silence from the CIA is procedure, not confession. The agency gives the same answer about almost anyone."
No, a Maduro Scenario Is Not Coming
Some Nigerians speculate that Tinubu could one day be seized and tried in America like Maduro, who was captured in a US military operation and arraigned in New York in January 2026 on narco-terrorism and trafficking charges. The comparison collapses on four points:
Indictment. Maduro faced a standing federal indictment from 2020. Tinubu has none, and an indictment is the legal foundation for any arrest or trial.
Time. The alleged conduct dates to the early 1990s. Federal drug charges generally must be brought within five years, a window that closed roughly three decades ago.
Recognition. Washington refused to recognize Maduro as a legitimate president. It fully recognizes Tinubu as the head of state of a strategic partner, which carries immunity in American courts.
Case type. The Greenspan matter is civil records litigation. The most it can produce is paper, never a prosecution.
Anyone predicting handcuffs is trading in political fantasy rather than law.
The Bottom Line
Strip away the myths and one hard truth remains. The Tinubu files dispute is a battle over transparency and public trust, not a prelude to prosecution and not evidence of an intelligence relationship. However, that does not make it harmless. When facts stay sealed, adversaries need not prove anything, because public doubt does the work for them. Every redacted page becomes raw material for conspiracy theories that will circulate aggressively as Nigeria approaches the 2027 elections. The perception war is already underway, and opacity is its ammunition. Citizens, journalists, and officials who can distinguish the documented record from the folklore are the first line of defense.
OSRS can help. Our team provides intelligence-driven research, disinformation threat assessments, and strategic advisory services for government, law enforcement, and private-sector leaders navigating contested information environments. Contact us to schedule a briefing on election-cycle influence threats and perception security.
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About the Author
Dr. Sunday Oludare Ogunlana is the Founder and CEO of OGUN Security Research and Strategic Consulting LLC and a Professor of Cybersecurity. He advises intelligence, policy, and national security bodies globally on security strategy, emerging technology threats, and African security affairs.
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