findings<\/a> proves that the image used to claim the apprehension of bandits by youth in Abia is actually from the kidnapping of a priest in Kaduna. To further verify, DUBAWA spoke with the Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO) of Abia State. She told DUBAWA that the police have no record of such an occurrence and explained that it is not the first time they have seen people create false stories about security progress and share them online.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the latest edition of DUBAWA\u2019s weekly round-up, we covered controversial issues from security, politics, and AI-generated photos, in Nigeria and internationally.\u00a0 The continuous spread of misinformation across social media and other platforms underscores the critical need for verification, media literacy, and information literacy. Here\u2019s a breakdown of the claims diligently scrutinised and fact-checked by DUBAWA in the last week. A Facebook page shared photos of the Sam Bangura Building and other streets in Freetown covered in snow, claiming that \u201cDi snow don block di road for we.\u201d The post suggests that Sierra Leone is experiencing snowfall, which has caused road blockages. DUBAWA found that the photos purportedly showing snow in Freetown appear digitally altered, with unusually smooth and bright snow typical of AI or editing tools. The Sierra Leone Meteorological Agency reported no snow or extreme temperature drops, and no media outlets covered such event, indicating the claim is false. A Facebook user claimed that a bandit mistakenly shot his leader during a celebration. The 53-second video showed a group of men gathered in a circle. One man holding a gun walked toward another and fired into the air. While he continued shooting carelessly, one of the bullets appeared to hit a man the Facebook user identified as the leader of the Fulani herdsmen in the gathering. We discovered that the video does not show bandits or any terrorist-related incident. It captures a tragic wedding accident in Amdirib, Chad, where a ceremonial gunshot mistakenly struck and killed the groom. A circulating nine-second edited video clip on WhatsApp, shared with the caption \u201cSLPP ADMITS FAILURE,\u201d claims that the Deputy Minister of Information and Civic Education publicly admitted that the SLPP-led government has failed. However, we checked and found that the Deputy Minister\u2019s words were taken from a four-minute video produced by Truth Media; however, the excerpt circulating on WhatsApp removes the necessary context. His statement referred specifically to Sierra Leone\u2019s performance on the MCC Government Effectiveness Indicator, not an admission that the government \u201chas failed.\u201d Truth Media has since issued a public clarification acknowledging that the clip and quote card were misleading without providing full context. Since President Donald Trump\u2019s statement on the state of security in Nigeria, social media platforms have taken to sharing diverse claims about kidnapping, attacks and conflicts in the country. One of such claims was shared by a Facebook user, @Teda vibes, who alleged that youths in Abia state captured over 30 armed Fulani Jihadists inside a forest. The result of DUBAWA\u2019s findings proves that the image used to claim the apprehension of bandits by youth in Abia is actually from the kidnapping of a priest in Kaduna. To further verify, DUBAWA spoke with the Police Public Relations Officer (PPRO) of Abia State. She told DUBAWA that the police have no record of such an occurrence and explained that it is not the first time they have seen people create false stories about security progress and share them online.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":26524,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"hannibal_claim_source":"","hannibal_source_label":"","hannibal_card_color":"blue","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","_wpscppro_dont_share_socialmedia":false,"_wpscppro_custom_social_share_image":0,"_facebook_share_type":"default","_twitter_share_type":"default","_linkedin_share_type":"default","_pinterest_share_type":"default","_linkedin_share_type_page":"","_instagram_share_type":"default","_medium_share_type":"","_threads_share_type":"","_google_business_share_type":"","_bluesky_share_type":"","_mastodon_share_type":"","_selected_social_profile":[],"_wpsp_enable_custom_social_template":false,"_wpsp_social_scheduling":{"enabled":false,"datetime":null,"platforms":[],"status":"template_only","dateOption":"today","timeOption":"now","customDays":"","customHours":"","customDate":"","customTime":"","schedulingType":"absolute"},"_wpsp_active_default_template":true},"categories":[1572,1571,3812,3815,123],"tags":[],"verdict":[],"ppma_author":[3793],"class_list":["post-26523","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-explainers","category-fact-check","category-headline","category-homepage","category-mainstream"],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8R6dE-6TN","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"authors":[{"term_id":3793,"user_id":0,"is_guest":1,"slug":"lademi-aborisade","display_name":"Lademi Aborisade","avatar_url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/?s=96&r=g","author_category":"","user_url":"","last_name":"","first_name":"","job_title":"","description":""}],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/12\/image-24.png?fit=1536%2C864&ssl=1","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26523","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26523"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26523\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26525,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26523\/revisions\/26525"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26523"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26523"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26523"},{"taxonomy":"verdict","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/verdict?post=26523"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dubawa.org\/dir\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/ppma_author?post=26523"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}