The purchases are the part of the story that has been told. What no telling of it has printed is the machinery underneath: powers of attorney executed in London and Washington, a wife standing as attorney-in-fact over her husband’s American houses, a mortgage taken in the name of a couple who told an intake officer the house would be their principal residence, and a paper trail that runs for twenty-six years, from a Potomac deed in 1992 to a Bowie sale in 2018. Documents in possession of SecretsReporters walk the instruments in the order they were recorded.
The keystone is a power of attorney recorded on 18 January 1995. The document opens with the man describing himself in his own instrument: Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu of Flat 9, 96-100 New Cavendish Street, London W1M 7FA, England. By it he appointed J.A. Adepoju his attorney for the purchase of 12625 Hillmeade Station Drive, Bowie, at a price not to exceed $147,000 and borrowing not to exceed $102,000. The deed was executed in London on 9 December 1994, and the notary’s acknowledgment on its third page records the identification the Senator produced: Senator Ahmed Bola Tinubu, who identified himself by production of his Nigerian passport number D302249.
The Hillmeade Station house moved on that authority. By deed made 9 January 1995 and recorded, Brendan A. Oak and Cindy Oak conveyed Lot 67, Block A, Hillmeade Station to Bola A. Tinubu for $147,000, the deed signed on his side by J.A. Adepoju as his attorney-in-fact. Three years later he sold it himself. By deed made 15 April 1998 and recorded, Bola A. Tinubu, described in the instrument as sole owner, conveyed the same Lot 67 to Titilayo B. Popoola and Olusola Popoola, husband and wife, for $150,000, the consideration certified under penalties of perjury, and the deed signed in his own hand before a Maryland notary.
The Potomac house was the first and the largest of the three. By deed made 20 January 1992 and recorded on 21 February 1992, James A. Gorgei and Betsy Gorgei conveyed Lot 9, Block P, Potomac Village, 10111 Limestone Court, Potomac, to Bola A. Tinubu for $450,000. When the house was refinanced, the authority again came from London. A power of attorney recorded on 27 July 1994 appoints Jonathan A. Adepoju his true and lawful attorney-in-fact for the refinance; it was signed on 10 May 1994 and acknowledged under a heading that styles the place the Kingdom of England, County of City of London, before E. F. A. Fogan, Notary Public of London, whose commission the document states expires with life.
By 1998 the authority had passed to his wife. On 13 October 1998 a power of attorney was recorded, granted to Oluremi S. Tinubu, with a deed of trust following it, an assignment in June 1999, and a release in July 2000. The end of the Potomac holding came on 6 September 2001, in the third year of his governorship of Lagos State. By deed recorded on 29 October 2001, Bola A. Tinubu conveyed 10111 Limestone Court to Russell M. B. Hirshon and Jennifer J. Hirshon for $600,000. He did not sign it. The signature block reads that Bola A. Tinubu signed by Donice M. Jeter, Substitute Attorney-in-Fact for Oluremi S. Tinubu, original Attorney-in-Fact, pursuant to a power of attorney dated 21 August 2001 and recorded immediately before the deed, the acknowledgment taken in the District of Columbia. The same chain runs forward: the Hirshons sold the house in October 2013 for $928,000.
The third house stood in both names from the first day, and it stood the longest. By deed made 1 May 1997 and recorded, Winchester-Maryland Development Company Joint Venture conveyed Lot 9, Block D, Plat Three, Woodmoore South, 1708 Parkside Drive, Mitchellville, to Bola A. Tinubu and Oluremi S. Tinubu, as tenants by the entirety, for $491,465. The intake sheet taken with the deed records a new mortgage of $270,300 taken on the purchase, a second instrument conveying to Judy H. Woody, Trustee, with GreenPoint Mortgage Corp. named, and answers the intake question whether the property would be the grantees’ principal residence in the affirmative: Yes. The couple acknowledged the deed in person in Montgomery County.
The Parkside paper trail outlasted two terms in Lagos and a national party leadership. The trail carries a deed of trust in October 1998, a release in January 1999, a further release on 4 May 2010, a lien recorded on 1 February 2011 with Oluremi S. Tinubu as grantor, and another release on 29 February 2012. The house itself was sold on 31 August 2018. By special warranty deed recorded on 11 September 2018, Bola A. Tinubu and Oluremi S. Tinubu, husband and wife, conveyed 1708 Parkside Drive to Regina Hampton Coleman and Keith B. Coleman for $700,000. Neither husband nor wife signed in person. Both signed by their attorney-in-fact, Abiodun Adepoju, under powers of attorney recorded immediately before the deed, the acknowledgment taken in the District of Columbia twenty-four years after the first Adepoju power of attorney was sworn in London.
The law that governs assets of this kind is the Code of Conduct for public officers under the Constitution. Every public officer is bound to declare his assets, and the duty covers not only the officer’s own assets but those of his spouse and his unmarried children below the age of eighteen. Declarations fall due on assumption of office, at the end of every four years, and at the end of tenure. Assets held outside Nigeria are declared in the currency of the country where they sit. An asset acquired after a declaration that cannot be fairly attributed to income, a gift or an approved loan is presumed to have been acquired in breach of the Code unless the contrary is proved. A breach carries removal from office, disqualification from holding public office for up to ten years, and seizure and forfeiture of the property in question to the state. On the face of the record, the Potomac house was held into the Lagos governorship and sold in its third year through the wife’s power of attorney, and the Parkside Drive house was held through both terms and for eleven years beyond them, under a paper trail that names husband and wife together from its first page.
Nothing stands under either name after the Parkside Drive sale of September 2018. What stands for the twenty-six years before is a complete run of deeds, deeds of trust, powers of attorney, assignments, releases and a lien across two counties: houses bought for $450,000, $147,000 and $491,465, a $270,300 mortgage, and houses sold for $150,000, $600,000 and $700,000, every transfer a matter of public record, most of them executed not by the owner at all but by the attorneys-in-fact he and his wife appointed, in London, in Maryland and in Washington.
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