A report has ruled out forgery of President Bola Tinubu’s academic records submitted to the Independent National Electoral Commission for the February 25 election.
In a report published by its Global Disinformation Team on Wednesday, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) said there was no evidence the president altered the information in the documents he presented to the commission contrary to claims by his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) rival, Atiku Abubakar.
During a press conference held in Abuja last Thursday, the former Vice President declared that Tinubu’s academic records were fraught with forgery and discrepancies.
This followed the release of the president’s documents by the Chicago State University in line with the directive of a court in the United States.
In his deposition, the CSU Registrar, Caleb Westberg, said Tinubu studied and graduated from the institution like every other student.
He, however, said the copy of the diploma the president presented to INEC did not emanate from CSU.
Atiku had since applied to file fresh evidence obtained from the institution against the former Lagos State governor at the Supreme Court.
But in the report, the BBC said the Social Security Number in the transcript from CSU matched what it had in other documents in which Tinubu’s gender was marked as male.
It reported that apart from the gender discrepancy, the birth dates in some of the released documents did not match the president’s official date of birth on March 29, 1952.
The report read: “Not every student graduates from university with honours. Mr. Tinubu, as attested to by CSU in several court documents seen by the BBC, did graduate from CSU with honours.
“During Mr. Westberg’s deposition, Mr. Atiku’s lawyer focused on the copy of the diploma President Tinubu handed to the electoral commission and suggested that it was unlike any of the diplomas released by CSU.
“However, while Mr Westberg agreed with Ms. Liu that the diploma in question does not look like the samples from 1979, he stated that the certificate actually looks like three of the diplomas CSU released to Mr. Abubakar. Our analysis confirms this.
“It turns out that the discrepancy in the appearance of the diploma is down to it having been re-issued in the 1990s.
“Mr. Westberg said the template of CSU’s diploma has changed several times over the years. He said any request for a new diploma would resemble the current template at that time, no matter when the student graduated.
“As such, if Mr. Tinubu had reordered his diploma in the late 1990s, what he would have been given would look like what was obtainable then.
“Three of the diplomas dating from the 1990s that CSU submitted were similar to Mr Tinubu’s.
“One of them, which bears the date 18 December 1998, is identical (aside from the names, class of degree, and dates) to the diploma Mr. Tinubu handed over to INEC
“Mr. Westberg also stated that CSU does not keep notes of when a graduate asks for the reissuing of a diploma and therefore Mr Tinubu’s request for a copy of the diploma was not recorded.
“The copy he gave to the election commission had part of the university logo missing, which Mr Westberg said in his deposition was possibly ‘cut off’ when it was photocopied.”
BBC also contacted CSU on the matter and the university reiterated its earlier position on the completion of President Tinubu’s studies.
“We are confident and always have been in the veracity and integrity of our records regarding Tinubu’s attendance and completion of graduation requirements,” It quoted CSU as saying in a statement.
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