President Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress have officially refuted claims that Tinubu submitted a counterfeit National Youth Service Corps discharge certificate to the electoral commission, as they sought to have a lawsuit aiming to disqualify him from the 2027 presidential election dismissed.

The ADC presidential candidate Atiku Abubakar and the ADC initiated the lawsuit, identified as FHC/ABJ/CS/1888/2026, at the Federal High Court in Abuja, naming Tinubu, the APC, and INEC as the defendants.

In a 25-paragraph affidavit, Atiku claimed that Tinubu provided an NYSC certificate that reflects the name “Tinubu Bola Adekunle," which he argued differs from the president's legal name and constitutes a forgery, stating that Tinubu has relied on this document since his 1999 bid for Lagos State governor.

Atiku is requesting the court to disqualify Tinubu and the APC from the 2027 election and to instruct INEC to erase their names from the list of eligible candidates and parties.

In a joint counter-affidavit submitted on September 9, APC Director of Legal Services Sanusi Samaila stated that Tinubu did not submit any Form CF001 to INEC for the 2023 or 2027 elections, contrary to the allegations made by the plaintiffs, and emphasized that the NYSC has never denied issuing a discharge certificate to Tinubu.

The defense also disputed Atiku's standing to file the case, noting that he is not a member of the APC and did not take part in the party's presidential primary in May, during which Tinubu was selected as the candidate.

INEC filed its own objection through Senior Advocate Dr. Alex Izinyon, labeling the lawsuit as statute-barred, lacking a reasonable cause of action, and an extreme misuse of court procedures; the commission has also contested a subsequent attempt by Atiku and the ADC to amend the lawsuit.

Justice Inyang Ekwo has allowed Atiku to serve legal documents on Tinubu via the APC, after his attorneys indicated that personal delivery to the president had been unsuccessful, and postponed the case to September 28 for further proceedings.

This dispute recalls similar accusations made against Tinubu during the 2023 election petitions, when a witness from the PDP presented his Chicago State University degree and an NYSC discharge certificate under the name “Bola Adekunle Tinubu” before the Presidential Election Petitions Court.

Those petitions ultimately failed.

To date, neither this previous litigation history nor the current lawsuit has resulted in any judicial determination of forgery against Tinubu.