The Independent National Electoral Commission on Saturday night debunked a fake statement, which credited it with instituting a probe on a 30 year-old forfeiture of $460,000 to the U.S. government by Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
The fake statement, bearing a forged signature of INEC National Commissioner, Festus Okoye, claimed that INEC had contacted the court in the U.S. state of Illinois, where an out-of-court settlement was reached in 1993.
“We are currently liaising with the Northern Illinois District Court in order to
establish more facts about the case before taking a decision.
“We are also studying the judgment in order to determine whether offences
which contradict the INEC guidelines and Electoral Act 2022 has been
committed.
“We endeavour to expedite the process and shall communicate the results of
our findings together with our decision to the general public within ten
working dates from today’s date”, the fake statement said.
It went viral and was used by many media, including Arise TV, Newspot.com, thenicheng.com and bloggers sympathetic to either Atiku Abubakar of the PDP or Peter Obi of Labour Party.
But hours after the fake news had spread like wild fire, INEC issued a statement, totally disowning it and its content.
Festus Okoye, whose signature was cloned in the earlier fake statement, issued the rebuttal:
A Press Release purported to have been issued by the Commission has been
trending online since yesterday Friday 11th November 2022. It claims that the
Commission has commenced investigation into a case of criminal forfeiture
against one of the Presidential candidates in the forthcoming General Election
and is liaising with a Court in the United States of America in pursuit of same to
determine possible violation of our guidelines or the Electoral Act 2022.
“We wish to state categorically that the said Press Release did not emanate from
the Commission nor is it pursuing the purported course of action. It is the
handiwork of mischief makers and utterly fake.
“Press Releases from the Commission are uploaded to the INC Press Corps
platform and simultaneously disseminated through our website and official
social media handles.
“The public is advised to ignore the Press Release.
Read the fake statement and the rebuttal:
To be sure, Asiwaju Tinubu has no case to answer in the United States. The court documents being circulated had long been in the public realm since 2003, ten years after the U.S. investigators found Tinubu non-indictable over the allegation of drug dealing.
There was no trial, no indictment, no charge.
Here is a further explanation from the campaigns FAQs:
One of the unconscionable and wicked lies peddled by political opponents about Bola Ahmed Tinubu was to paint him erroneously as a drug baron.
The accusation arose out of an investigation by FBI agent Kevin Moss of Tinubu and Compass Investment and Finance accounts at First Heritage Bank and Citi- Bank in the U.S.
On January 10, 1992, Mr Kevin Moss requested and obtained a court order to freeze the accounts.
On January 13, 1992, Mr Moss telephoned Tinubu in Nigeria to justify the amounts in the accounts, running into $1.4 million. Part of the money was said to have been deposited by two Nigerians, being investigated for drug offences.
After the telephone conversation, Tinubu instructed his lawyer in the US to file a lawsuit against the order freezing his accounts.
This dragged on till 15 September 1993, when an agreement was reached for an out of court settlement. Judge John A Nordberg, of the US district court for the Northern District of Illinois, read out the agreement reached by the two parties. Part of the funds, $460,000 was seized by the government.
The FBI never charged Tinubu with any drug offence; the case did not go on trial. Tinubu was never convicted. And he was never barred from entering the United States.
In 2003, ten years after, when the PDP opponents wanted to use the shuttered allegation to disqualify Tinubu from running for a second term in Lagos, the Inspector General of Police, Tafa Balogun made an enquiry with the American Consulate on Tinubu’s status.
The Consulate gave Tinubu a clean bill in a reply by the Legal Attache, Michael H. Bonner.
The letter read:
“Our sincerest greetings to you and all of the law enforcement personnel in the Nigeria Police Force, whose continued assistance is very much appreciated. In relation to your letter, dated February 3, 2003, reference number SR. 3000/IGPSEC/ABJ/VOL. 24/287, regarding Governor Bola Ahmed Tinubu, a records check of the Federal
Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) National Crime Information Centre (NCIC) was conducted.
“The results of the checks were negative for any criminal arrest records, wants,
or warrants for Bola Ahmed Tinubu (DOB 29 March 1952). For information of your department, NCIC is a very centralised information centre that maintains the records of every criminal arrest and conviction within the United States and its territories.”
Almost thirty years after the allegation was discharged and the case declared dead, Tinubu’s opponents keep waking up its corpse, in futile efforts to malign him.
*Culled from Tinubu-Shettima Presidential Campaign: FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions)
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