Map of Zamfara State. Photo credit: The Guardian Nigeria News.
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Claim: An X user, BIG JOE OF LAGOS (@JosephOnuorah), shared a 38-second video showing women, children and other people crossing a river and claimed they were residents of Birnin Magaji in Zamfara State fleeing a recent bandit attack.
Verdict: Insufficient Evidence. The video has been online since June 2026, but we were unable to verify the alleged bandit attack on Birnin Magaji in Zamfara State.
Full Text
Social media platforms have increasingly become a major source of information during security incidents, particularly in communities affected by banditry and other forms of violence. However, the speed at which such content spreads can also make it difficult for users to distinguish between footage of a recent incident and older material recirculated to appear as a new event.
On Monday, Aug. 24, 2026, an X user, BIG JOE OF LAGOS (@JosephOnuorah), shared a 38-second video showing several people, apparently including women and children, crossing a river at a distance. The post claimed that the people were residents of Birnin Magaji, Zamfara State, fleeing a recent attack by bandits.
The post’s caption reads, “After several attacks – Whole village sacked by bandits in Birnin Magaji – Zamfara State. Women and children crossing a river in desperation as they flee from the attackers. What exactly is Tinubu returning to do in Aso Rock?”
As of Aug. 26, 2026, the post (archived here) attracted 128,300 views, 956 reposts, 916 likes, 60 comments and 84 bookmarks, exposing the claim to thousands of social media users.
Some users reacted to the post by discussing insecurity, political leadership and the alleged response of governments to banditry.
One user, @Iam_Turnt22, asked whether the people involved had seen their present and past governors. Another user, @akanjiabiodun01, accused residents and political actors of enabling terrorists, while @DaddyBKnK questioned why the people did not use the “coastal road” associated with President Bola Tinubu.
The reactions show how the video was being interpreted as evidence of a fresh security incident and used to support wider political arguments. Hence, we investigated to determine when the footage was recorded and the circumstances surrounding its circulation.
Verification
To establish whether the video was recorded during a recent attack in Birnin Magaji, DUBAWA extracted multiple key frames from the footage and subjected them to a Google Lens reverse image search.
The reverse image search produced several visual matches, including two exact matches of the video. The findings showed that the footage had been circulating online several weeks before the Aug. 24, 2026 post.
One of the exact matches was a Facebook post published on June 4, 2026, by the verified user Alhaji Ismail Salisu Adamu Tumfafi. The post contained the same footage and was captioned in Hausa: “Innalillahi Wainna Ilaihirrajuun Wannan Wace Rayuwa ce.”
The Facebook post further explained in English that the footage was not of people at a beach for recreation but showed an attempt to survive a bandit attack in Birnin Magaji community of Zamfara State. It stated that women and children were willing to risk drowning while fleeing the attackers.
This finding establishes that the footage existed online approximately 81 days before the Aug. 24, 2026 X post. Although the location and circumstances described in the original June post correspond to those in the claim (Birnin Magaji and a bandit attack), the footage is not new.
A second match we found was on YouTube. The account @neptuneprimetv8957 published the same video on June 6, 2026, with the caption: “Women, Children Flee Zamfara Community as Bandits Advance…”
The June 6 upload provides another independent indication that the video had already circulated publicly more than two months before the X post under review.
Further verification revealed that an X user, @secmxx, also shared the same footage on June 2, 2026. In addition to the video in the claim, the account posted another video showing the same group of people crossing the river.
The accompanying post stated that women and children from Birnin Magaji town, Zamfara State, were crossing a major river to escape a bandit attack “yesterday.” It also described the movement of residents away from vulnerable communities as a strategy for reducing deaths and kidnappings during attacks.
We conducted a keyword search to establish whether the reported Birnin Magaji attack and the displacement of residents were independently reported when the footage first circulated in June. We used “Birnin Magaji”, “Zamfara”, “bandit attack”, “women and children fleeing” and related terms to search. We found a Facebook post by the Nigerian Armed Forces and the Military, as well as reports from News Africa, Ohamadike TV, among others. However, we found no report of the incident in major national newspapers.
While these social-media publications provide additional evidence that the footage and the accompanying account of residents fleeing a bandit attack were already circulating in early June, they do not, on their own, independently verify that the reported attack happened.
The existence of these earlier posts establishes the chronology of the footage, which was already publicly available in early June 2026, while the claim under review was made on Aug. 24, 2026.
Conclusion
DUBAWA’s verification found that the video shared by BIG JOE OF LAGOS to represent a recent incident is an old video that had circulated earlier since June 2026. We were, however, unable to verify the alleged attack on Birnin Magaji in Zamfara State.
This fellowship is implemented by the Centre for Journalism Innovation and Development (CJID) with support from the European Union.
