Sen. Bola Ahmed Tinubu

Bola Ahmed Adekunle Tinubu was born on 29 March 1952 in Lagos, the son of Abibatu Mogaji — the long-serving Iyaloja-General of Lagos markets (d. 2013) — and a father whose identity has been the subject of decades of public dispute. His early-life record is contested: he says he was educated at St John's Primary School Aroloya, Children's Home School Ibadan and Government College Ibadan before travelling to the United States in 1975. He worked at GTE Services Corporation and Deloitte Haskins & Sells in Chicago and graduated from Chicago State University (BSc Accounting, 1979); the university confirmed the degree after extensive litigation during the 2023 election dispute. He returned to Nigeria in the early 1980s and joined Mobil Oil Nigeria as Senior Company Auditor and Treasurer.

He entered electoral politics as Senator for Lagos West on the SDP platform in the abortive Third Republic (1992–93), aligning with Chief M.K.O. Abiola in the June 12 movement; after the annulment he was a founding figure of NADECO in Lagos, fleeing into exile in London and the United States after threats from the Abacha regime. He returned in 1998 and won the 1999 Lagos State governorship on the Alliance for Democracy ticket; he served two terms (1999–2007), surviving the Obasanjo-era seizure of Lagos local-government funds (resolved by the Supreme Court in his favour in 2005), and recruiting the technocratic team — Babatunde Fashola, Yemi Osinbajo, Wale Edun, Akinwunmi Ambode, Ben Akabueze, Tunde Fowler, Akin Doherty — that would dominate Lagos and ultimately federal governance for the next two decades. His introduction of GIS-based property taxation (Land Use Charge, 2001), the Lagos State Internal Revenue Service, and the BRT system rebuilt Lagos as the only Nigerian state with a non-oil tax base sufficient to fund its own budget.

From 2007 he became the most consequential Nigerian political organiser of the Fourth Republic — financier and chief strategist of the AC (2006), ACN (2010), and the 2013 merger that produced the All Progressives Congress (APC). His 'Emi lokan' ('It is my turn') declaration at the Abeokuta APC consultations of June 2022 forced his ticket past Vice-President Yemi Osinbajo and Senate President Ahmad Lawan; he won the APC primary at the Eagle Square convention on 8 June 2022 with 1,271 votes against Amaechi (316) and Osinbajo (235). He picked Senator Kashim Shettima of Borno as running mate — the first same-faith Muslim-Muslim ticket since the abortive Abiola-Kingibe ticket of 1993.

He won the 25 February 2023 election with 36.6% of the vote (8.79 m), against Atiku Abubakar (PDP, 6.98 m, 29.1%) and Peter Obi (Labour, 6.10 m, 25.4%) in the most fragmented presidential field since 1979 — the first time a candidate has been elected on under 40% of the vote in the Fourth Republic. The election was contested before the Presidential Election Petition Court and the Supreme Court (Atiku Abubakar v. INEC, Peter Obi v. INEC; both dismissed September–October 2023). At his inauguration on 29 May 2023 the unscripted line 'subsidy is gone' triggered the immediate removal of the petroleum subsidy; on 14 June 2023 the CBN unified the foreign-exchange windows and floated the naira. The two reforms produced the deepest cost-of-living shock since the 1986 SAP — petrol rose from ₦185 to ₦617 per litre (October 2023) and to ₦998 (June 2024); the naira fell from ₦461/$ (May 2023) to ₦1,650/$ (October 2024); headline CPI inflation peaked at 34.2% (June 2024).

His administration has launched the Nigerian Education Loan Fund (NELFUND, 2024), the consumer-credit corporation (Credicorp), the Tax Reform Acts of June 2025 (Nigeria Tax Act, Nigeria Tax Administration Act, Nigeria Revenue Service Act, Joint Revenue Board Act) — the most comprehensive tax overhaul since the 1939 Income Tax Ordinance — and a federal civil service compression. The August 2024 #EndBadGovernance protests (Hunger Protests) were the largest mass action since #EndSARS; the 2024–25 JAMB CBT marking scandal and the WAEC torchlight controversy of June 2025 marked the political tensions of the period. He is the first Yoruba (Awori) Muslim Head of State in Nigerian history and the first elected President from Lagos State. He is married to Senator Oluremi Tinubu, who as First Lady is the first to have served three terms in the Senate (Lagos Central, 2011–23) before entering Aso Rock.