Photo source: DUBAWA
|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
From Nigeria, to Sierra Leone, to Libéria, misinformation and disinformation continue to spread briskly offline and online. While these false narratives tend to influence public conversations, DUBAWA continues to keep its mission of promoting information integrity across Africa by debunking them.
In the last week of May, DUBAWA fact-checked various claims on different issues, mostly on Facebook. Find the summary below:
- Peter Obi clinched NDC presidential ticket
An X post asserted that Peter Obi had won the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) presidential ticket with 22 million votes.
However, DUBAWA’s research shows that the assertion paints a misleading narrative. We scoured through reports from credible news outlets in the country and found that the NDC had released only its timetable for the sale of forms and the primary elections.
Thus, as of when the claimant made the post, the party has yet to conduct its presidential primaries.
Find the full details here.
- Miracle leaf cures blurry vision, other eye conditions
A Facebook user, Samuel Rebecca, shared a clip alleging that miracle leaves can treat multiple eye conditions, including glaucoma.
DUBAWA found that although miracle leaves contain antimicrobial properties which are useful in traditional medicine, laboratory studies have established that it does not have the potency to cure eye diseases in human beings.
We spoke to medical specialists who debunked the assertion.
Find more details here.
- Sierra Leonean influencer meets Afrobeats female singers
Also on Facebook, a claim circulated that Establish Goba, a social media sensation in Sierra Leone, has recently met with two Afrobeats heavyweights, Simi and Tiwa Savage.
DUBAWA verified the assertion by reviewing the social media accounts of the Nigerian music stars, including Establish herself. We found that Establish had uploaded a similar picture earlier, but without the singers.
Then, we conducted a digital analysis on the image attached to the post and found that it was AI-generated.
Read the full report here.
- Xenophobia: Clip shows Nigerians attacking S’A residents
Recently, there was a renewed trend of xenophobic attacks in South Africa, which has led to loss of lives and created fear for many migrants in the country.
In light of this, an allegation started circulating on X recently that Nigerians have begun to attack South Africans and have even injured a few.
DUBAWA investigated the claim and found that the attached footage originated from Mombasa, an area in the Democratic Republic of Congo and unrelated to the attacks.
- Video showing torture scene of Oyo attack victims
Panic erupted in Oyo State recently following the abduction of 46 children and their teachers in Esinele and Yawota areas of the state, an incident that has provoked widespread criticism of authorities ever since.
Some social media users uploaded footage purportedly showing how the kidnappers are torturing the students. In the video, armed men were dropping a melting yellow keg on three blindfolded young men with their hands tied to their backs while the young men continued to cry and scamper in pain.
DUBAWA broke the video into keyframes and subjected its screen grabs to a reverse image search, with results showing that the same footage had been on social media 16 days before the Oyo attacks.
Get the full story here.
- Ebola breaks out in Liberia
The social media space in Liberia was recently flooded with the news that the deadly 2014 Ebola virus that claimed lives in the Francophone country has again returned.
The claim featured a voice recording saying that the virus was brought into the country by some Christians who went for an outing in Uganda.
Bearing in mind the health implications of this assertion in Liberia, we swiftly contacted authorities within the nation’s health sector and obtained statements from three national agencies, describing the claim as unfounded and untrue.
Read more about DUBAWA’s findings on this here.
Patrick ide (emekaide@hotmail.com)