The Nigerian Twitter space is agog as #TinubuTheDrugDealer trends following the publication of Nigeria’s president-elect, Bola Tinubu’s drug trafficking case by UberFacts.
UberFacts, an online outlet that publishes random facts, on Monday, informed its 13.5 million followers on Twitter about Tinubu’s legal woes with the United States government in 1993 which made him forfeit $460,000 ill-gotten gains from heroin trafficking.
In 1993, Bola Ahmed Tinubu surrendered $460,000 to the US government after a Chicago court found the income came from heroin trafficking pic.twitter.com/aRzrTXJtl4
— UberFacts (@UberFacts) April 9, 2023
The tweet, which has now been viewed by more than 15 million people across the globe as of the time of writing this report, has thrust the matter to the limelight, adding to the series of controversies about Tinubu and worsening the animosity between his supporters and critics.
In a follow-up tweet, UberFacts shared the Certified True Copies of court documents to back up its claim.
🇳🇬: RE Tinubu tweet
For clarification, the source was United States Court documents which are public records and available in their entirety here: https://t.co/yFHCgRtF6Z pic.twitter.com/GNfbm5bB0l
— UberFacts (@UberFacts) April 10, 2023
Like the previous one, the new tweet went viral with 5.2 million views as of the time of writing this report, sparking a debate on the reliability of the platform.
While Tinubu’s camp and supporters have discredited the Twitter page, tagging the publication as a campaign of calumny against the President-elect, the report ignited the opposition against Tinubu’s victory at the last presidential election held on February 25, 2023.
As of the time of writing this report, #TinubuTheDrugDealer, which is the opposition’s reaction to UberFacts’ post, sits on the second-place trend on Twitter with 5,584 tweets.
This is not the first time the issue of Tinubu’s illicit business is heating social media.
Nigerian investigative journalist David Hundeyin wrote “Bola Ahmed Tinubu: From Drug Lord To Presidential Candidate” in July 2022, detailing how the former governor of Lagos state ran a drug cartel while residing in Chicago in the 90s.
A month later, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois released a 56-page document of the case as reported by Peoples Gazette, further reigniting interest in Tinubu’s drug-dealing background.
Furthermore, the matter is part of the charges brought before the presidential election tribunal by the Labour Party’s presidential candidate, Peter Obi to challenge the outcome of the presidential election.
Obi is praying the court to disqualify Tinubu over his drug deals which led to the forfeiture of the proceeds of the business to the US government in the early ’90s. According to Obi, this contravenes Nigerian law and makes Tinubu ineligible to contest the presidential election.
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