Claim 12
CLAIM: A Twitter user, Senior man (@her_genie), made a post with a pictorial chart of Premium Times’ election result dashboard revealing several numbers of votes scored by the top four candidates in the
presidential election on Monday, February 27, 2023.
FINDING: The Premium Times official dashboard shows that the votes for the Labour Party, PDP, APC and NNPP had been doctored in the graphic shared by the Twitter user. Also, the chart in the post had also been rearranged by political parties with PDP first. The total votes by state and the total votes by percentage (%) were also omitted. The graphic also missed the mark on the votes of senatorial district measured, which was 5,000 instead of 500,000 on the newspaper’s dashboard.
VERDICT: INCORRECT
SOURCE: Premium Times
DATE: 27/03/2023
Claim 11
CLAIM: A viral WhatsApp claim has circulated challenging the authenticity of Labour Party’s (LP) votes (11,397) in Ekiti.
FINDING: According to the ICIR’s report on the presidential election results in Ekiti state, the total vote cast was 314,472, and the valid vote cast was 308,171. In the report, APC had 201,494 votes; PDP had 89,554 while LP had 11,397. Thus, if you subtract 302,445 from 308,171, you will get 5,726. Therefore, the total number of votes from the remaining parties was 5,726. According to the claimant, the total number of accredited votes is inaccurate.
VERDICT: INCORRECT
SOURCE: ICIRDATE: 27/02/23
Claim 10
CLAIM: An invitation card claiming that Babajide Sanwo-Olu, the Lagos state governor, is holding a dinner and one-on-one conversation with the Igbo captain of industry is doing rounds on WhatsApp.
FINDING: As Bola Tinubu lost Lagos state, his historical stronghold, to the Labour Party (LP) following Saturday’s presidential election, there are speculations that the Lagos state governor is trying to get the Igbos in the state to vote for him in the forthcoming March 11 governorship election. Jubril Gawat, Sanwo-Olu’s senior special assistant on new media, debunked the claim in a tweet with a version of the invitation card stamped with “Fake News” on Monday, February 27, 2023.
VERDICT: INCORRECT
SOURCE: Jubril Gawat, senior special assistant to the Lagos state governor on new media.
DATE: 27/02/2023
Claim 9
CLAIM: A one-minute and 38 seconds TikTok video circulating on WhatsApp claims that “Ekiti election 2023 is fake results.”
FINDING: The original video, which is 22 minutes long, was posted on YouTube nearly eight years ago, precisely on March 31, 2015. It shows the moment a former minister of the Niger Delta, Godsday Orubebe, an agent of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), disrupted the national collation and announcement of the 2015 presidential election results on the same day the video was posted online.
VERDICT: INCORRECT
SOURCE: YouTube, Premium Times, Punch newspaper
DATE: 27/02/2023
Claim 8
CLAIM: Social media users claimed Peter Obi, the Labour Party’s (LP) presidential candidate, has polled over 1 million votes in Plateau State.
FINDING: The result is yet to be announced officially by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as of 2.30 p.m. on Monday, February 27, when this report was filed. However, TheCable’s report on votes polled in Plateau State showed that Mr Obi had so far won eight LGAs while PDP won 2 LGAs out of the 17 LGAs in the state. In total, the LP presidential candidate polled 301,905 votes in Plateau state.
VERDICT: MISLEADING.
SOURCE: TheCable Newspaper
DATE: 27-02-2023
Claim 7
CLAIM: A post shared on Facebook claimed that thugs had set fire to shops owned by Igbo traders in Ladipo market in Lagos. The post has also been circulated on WhatsApp.
FINDING: Checks showed that the video was from a 2022 fire incident in the market. Nosa Okunbor, the public relations officer of the Lagos State Emergency Management Agency (LASEMA), also said he had not received a report of any fire incident in the market as of Monday, February 27, 2023.
VERDICT: INCORRECT
SOURCE: LASEMA, Google reverse image search
DATE: 27/02/2023
Claim 6
CLAIM: A Twitter user, @NajibHaruna_, claimed that Ibrahim Bello Muhammad, 27, the newly elected House of Reps member in Kebbi State, is the youngest federal lawmaker in Nigeria’s history.
FINDING: Findings show that Gabriel Saleh Zock of the APC, a first-term member representing the Kachial/Kagarko Federal Constituency of Kaduna State, is currently the youngest lawmaker in the House of Representatives. Gabriel was born on November 20, 1985. He became a lawmaker at the age of 34. If Bello is sworn in, he will break the record.
VERDICT: CORRECT
SOURCES: Media reports
DATE: 27/02/2023
Claim 5
CLAIM: Bashir Ahmad, Special Assistant on Digital Communications to Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari, on his Twitter handle, claims that APC has won the elections in 14 states, PDP in 7, LP in 4 and NNPP in 1.
FINDING: Reports by credible media platforms such as Channels TV and Premium Times reveal that INEC has declared the results of only one state, Ekiti, out of the 36 States in Nigeria as of 9am on Monday.
VERDICT: INCORRECT
SOURCES: Channels TV, Premium Times
Claim 4
CLAIM: Social media users say the image uploaded on INEC’s IReV for Ekiti polling unit, not the result sheet.
FINDING: NFC’s visit to the INEC IReV portal confirms the report to be true. The image uploaded on the portal, as at this fact-check, differed from the INEC result sheet for the polling unit with code 13/01/02/001 under Ado ‘B’ Inisa Ward/RA in Ado Ekiti Local government area. It rather contained the image of a young lady in a room.
VERDICT: True
SOURCE: INEC IReV Portal
DATE: 27-02-2023
Claim 3
CLAIM: The headline of a news report on ejesgist.ng claims that the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, defeated the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate, Bola Tinubu, to win all 20 local government areas in Osun State.
FINDING: Osun State has 30 local government areas. INEC result viewing portal shows that polling unit results of the 2023 presidential election have been uploaded from all 30 local government areas. The results declared at the national collation centre show that Atiku won 20 local governments while Tinubu won the remaining 10 LGAs.
VERDICT: MISLEADING.
SOURCES: INEC IRev portal, Multiple media reports
DATE: 27/02/2023
Claim 2
CLAIM: A Twitter user @drpenking tweeted an image that showed the Labour Party got 29,568 votes in Agege and claimed INEC switched the results to APC and reduced the numbers for Labour Party to 13,270.
FINDING: Updates from various news outlets shows that APC won the Labour Party by a landslide in Agege local government area. We collated the results for each party and found that APC actually had 29,568 votes while Labour Party had a lesser total number of votes.
VERDICT: INCORRECT.
SOURCES: Multiple media reports
DATE: 27/02/2023
Claim 1
CLAIM: Peoples Gazette headline reads that soldiers shoot ‘Oluomo’ dead at collation centre.
FINDING: From the comment section, the NFC observed that some social media users were curious about which Oluomo was actually killed. Although the report states that PDP supporter Akinlabi Akinnaso, also known as Oluomo, was shot dead, reactions from commenters indicate confusion, prompting our check. The deceased is not the popular Lagos State NURTW chairman, MC Oluomo.
VERDICT: MISLEADING.
SOURCE: Vanguard Newspaper, Punch Newspaper
DATE: 27-02-2023
This live-check was jointly researched and written by members of the Nigerian Fact-Checkers’ Coalition (NFC): Nurudeen Akewushola, Faith Abeka, Fatimah Quadri (FactCheckHub); Rosemary Ajayi (Digital Africa Research Lab); Daniel Adaji (The Insight); Elizabeth Ogunbamowo, Lois Ugbede, Cole Praise, Silas Jonathan, Lateef Sanni (DUBAWA); Catherine Adeniyi, Motunrayo Joel, Allwell Okpi, Seyi Awojuyigbe, Fatimah Abubakar, Abisola Olasupo (Africa Check); Rejoice Ewodage, Hannah Ajakaiye (FactsMatterNG), Shehu Olayinka and Bamas Victoria (ICIR).It was edited and approved for publication by Kemi Busari, Caroline Anipah, Simbiat Bakare (DUBAWA), David Ajikobi (Africa Check), Ajibola Amzat, and Opeyemi Kehinde (FactCheckHub).
