A remarkable new chapter has opened in Nigeria’s increasingly bitter 2027 presidential contest after former Vice-President and African Democratic Congress (ADC) presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, asserted that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is 90 years old and said he possesses documentary evidence to prove it in court.
The claim, made in a BBC interview released on Friday, has immediately revived one of Nigeria’s most enduring political controversies: when exactly was Bola Tinubu born?
Atiku did not merely suggest that Tinubu is older than officially acknowledged. He tied the assertion directly to his argument that age and physical fitness should not disqualify him from seeking the presidency again.
“We have a president who is 90 years old now and who is sick, and I am healthy; I am strong, so why would I not make my services available to my fellow countrymen?” Atiku said.
When the BBC interviewer challenged him, pointing out that Tinubu was not 90, Atiku did not retreat.
“I have evidence that he is [90], and I will present it in court,” he said.
That statement has transformed what initially appeared to be another political argument over the age of presidential candidates into a potentially significant evidentiary dispute.
As of Saturday, August 29, there is no publicly produced document independently establishing that Tinubu is 90. The available official Nigerian records instead identify his date of birth as March 29, 1952, which makes him 74. But there is also a documented history of conflicting birth dates in some of the records released during the 2023 election litigation involving Chicago State University.
That distinction is crucial.
The official record: Tinubu is 74
The strongest current public record supports March 29, 1952 as Tinubu’s date of birth.
The All Progressives Congress (APC), the party on whose platform Tinubu won the presidency in 2023, identifies him as having been born in Lagos on March 29, 1952.
More significantly, the State House itself recognised Tinubu’s 74th birthday on March 29, 2026.
In a birthday message published by the Presidency, Tinubu said he was marking his 74th birthday and signed the statement in his capacity as President and Commander-in-Chief.
Vice-President Kashim Shettima also publicly congratulated Tinubu on turning 74.
On that official record, therefore, Tinubu would be: 74 years old in August 2026; 75 on March 29, 2027; 79 at the end of a second four-year presidential term in 2031, if re-elected.
For Atiku’s assertion of 90 to be correct, Tinubu would instead have to have been born around 1936.
That would mean a difference of approximately 16 years between the officially declared age and the age now alleged by Atiku.
*But there is a real documentary complication
The controversy cannot responsibly be dismissed by saying that there have never been discrepancies in Tinubu’s records.
There were.
During the legal battle over Tinubu’s educational credentials following the 2023 presidential election, records obtained from Chicago State University (CSU) became central to the dispute.
Registrar Caleb Westberg showed that different university records contained different years of birth. One record identified March 29, 1954, while another identified March 29, 1955. The publicly reported Nigerian date is March 29, 1952.
Westberg, however, testified that CSU’s records also contained information identifying Tinubu as the same individual who had attended the institution and graduated in 1979. He attributed discrepancies in the dates to possible human error in the records.
That history matters because it demonstrates that there have been discrepancies over Tinubu’s year of birth in historical documents.
But it does not establish a birth year of 1936.
Indeed, the known conflicting CSU dates — 1952, 1954 and 1955 – all place Tinubu in his early 70s today, rather than at 90.
Thus, Atiku’s present claim requires something substantially different from the discrepancies that have already entered the public record: it would require evidence placing Tinubu’s birth approximately two decades earlier than some of the disputed university records.
*What would a 1936 birth date mean?
If Tinubu were born in 1936, as the “90 years old” assertion implies, he would have been approximately: 43 when he graduated from Chicago State University in 1979; 56 when he became Lagos State governor in 1999; 60 in 1996, the year of a photograph now being cited in the political debate; 71 when he became president in 2007? No – this is precisely why chronology matters: Tinubu did not become president until 2023, when a 1936 birth date would have made him about 87; 87 when elected president in 2023 and 90 in 2026.
The historical chronology therefore gives investigators an important framework for testing the claim, although chronology and photographs alone cannot prove someone’s date of birth.
*The Tinubu career timeline
The publicly documented Tinubu biography places his early life in Lagos before his move to the United States, where he studied at what is now Richard J. Daley College and subsequently Chicago State University. The APC biography says he graduated from Chicago State University in 1979.
He returned to Nigeria and worked as an accountant before entering politics.
In 1992, he won election to the Senate representing Lagos West during Nigeria’s short-lived Third Republic. Following the annulment of the June 12, 1993 presidential election and the subsequent military crackdown, Tinubu became involved in the pro-democracy struggle and later lived in exile. He returned to Nigeria after the transition towards civilian rule.
He won election as governor of Lagos State in 1999 and served two terms, leaving office in 2007.
He subsequently became one of the most influential figures in the formation and development of the political structure that eventually became the APC. His political network helped him emerge as the party’s presidential candidate in 2022, and he defeated Atiku and other contenders in the February 2023 presidential election.
He was sworn in as president on May 29, 2023. The publicly documented chronology is therefore extensive and spans several decades.
Atiku’s own age is considerably less controversial.
Ironically, the allegation about Tinubu’s age came while Atiku was being questioned about his own age and whether he would be too old to serve a full presidential term.
Atiku was born on November 25, 1946, according to multiple biographical sources, including the Biographical Legacy and Research Foundation and the Nigerian National Library’s biographical material.
He is therefore 79 years old as of August 29, 2026, and will turn 80 on November 25.
If he wins the 2027 presidential election and completes a four-year term, he would leave office at about 84.
That makes Atiku older than Tinubu by roughly five years under the official dates of birth.
The former vice-president has nevertheless insisted that age should not determine his fitness for office.
“Do I look to you like someone who has reached 80 years of age?” he asked during the BBC Hausa interview after being questioned about the possibility that voters might consider his age a disadvantage.
His argument is straightforward: experience, competence, physical strength and mental alertness, rather than chronological age alone, should determine whether a candidate can govern.
*Who is Atiku Abubakar?
Atiku’s political career is itself unusually long.
Born in Jada in what was then the British Cameroons, now Adamawa State, on November 25, 1946, he was raised in northeastern Nigeria. His father, Garba Abubakar, was a trader and farmer, while his mother was Aisha Kande.
He entered public service and spent about two decades in the Nigerian Customs Service, rising to the position of deputy director before retiring in 1989. He subsequently built a substantial business career and became increasingly involved in politics.
His first major presidential ambition came in the early 1990s, when he contested the Social Democratic Party’s presidential primary. He finished behind Moshood Abiola and Babagana Kingibe.
After the return to democratic rule, Atiku became governor-elect of Adamawa State in 1998 but did not serve as governor because he was selected as Olusegun Obasanjo’s running mate.
The Obasanjo-Atiku ticket won the 1999 presidential election, and the pair were re-elected in 2003. Atiku served as vice-president from 1999 to 2007.
His relationship with Obasanjo subsequently deteriorated, producing one of the most consequential political rivalries of the Fourth Republic.
Atiku has since contested the presidency repeatedly – including in 2007, 2019 and 2023 – before becoming the ADC’s presidential candidate for the 2027 election. His political longevity is therefore comparable to Tinubu’s, although the two men travelled very different routes to national prominence.
*Atiku and Tinubu: rivals with intertwined histories
The present confrontation is not between political newcomers.
Both men have been major actors in Nigerian politics since the 1990s. Both were involved in the struggle over the direction of the country’s emerging Fourth Republic. Both have repeatedly sought the presidency, and their political paths finally collided directly in the 2023 election.
Tinubu defeated Atiku in that election.
The former vice-president subsequently challenged the result in court, while disputes over Tinubu’s academic credentials and other eligibility questions became part of the post-election litigation.
A United States federal court case brought by Atiku in 2023 sought discovery from Chicago State University concerning Tinubu’s records. The court record confirms that Atiku was seeking CSU documents and testimony for use in his Nigerian electoral challenge.
The latest age allegation therefore does not emerge in a vacuum. It comes after years of litigation and political argument over Tinubu’s personal records.
There is another important development.
On August 14, 2026, Atiku and the ADC filed a fresh action at the Federal High Court in Abuja seeking Tinubu’s disqualification from the 2027 presidential election over an alleged forged National Youth Service Corps certificate.
The APC and INEC were joined in the case.
Atiku personally appeared at the court registry to depose to an affidavit, arguing that the matter concerns the constitutional qualification of a presidential candidate.
The suit invokes, among other provisions, Section 137(1)(j) of the Constitution, concerning presentation of a forged certificate to INEC. Atiku’s affidavit alleges discrepancies involving the name on the NYSC document and asks the court to examine relevant electoral records. Those allegations remain matters for judicial determination.
This recent litigation makes Atiku’s promise to produce evidence of Tinubu’s alleged age particularly noteworthy.
He has effectively moved the argument from the political stage to the evidentiary arena.
If he has a document showing a 1936 birth date, the legal significance will depend on its provenance, authenticity, chain of custody, relevance and how it compares with other official records.
A politician saying that he has evidence is not itself evidence.
*The 1996 photograph enters the debate
One of the first public reactions came from former presidential aide and ambassador-designate Reno Omokri.
Omokri circulated a photograph he said showed Tinubu with journalist and publisher Dele Momodu in London in 1996.
His argument was that if Tinubu were 90 in 2026, he would have been 60 when the photograph was taken.
Omokri challenged Nigerians to examine the photograph and questioned whether Tinubu appeared to be 60 at the time.
The photograph may be politically useful, but it should not be mistaken for scientific proof of age.
People can look considerably younger or older than their chronological age, and the appearance of a person in an old photograph cannot establish a birth date.
The more important question is whether Momodu can independently authenticate the photograph’s date, location and circumstances – and, more importantly, whether documentary records exist to establish Tinubu’s actual birth year.
The health allegation is a separate question
Atiku also alleged that Tinubu is sick and contrasted the President’s alleged condition with his own claim of being healthy and strong.
That allegation should be treated separately from the age question.
There is no medical evidence publicly produced by Atiku alongside his statement that establishes the President is medically incapable of performing his constitutional duties.
Indeed, Tinubu has continued to carry out public presidential functions in August. State House records show him directing national security policy, while recent official reports document presidential engagements and statements.
That does not establish that the President has no health issues; nor can routine public appearances provide a medical diagnosis.
It simply means that Atiku’s assertion of illness is an allegation, not an established medical fact. (Everyday.ng)
