Fact Check: More than a decade old photos passed off as recent attacks by troops in Nigeria’s Imo State
India Today
If social media is to be believed, the viral photos show a recent attack in the Orsu Local Government Area where houses and other property were destroyed.
A set of three photos, supposedly showing massive destruction caused by Nigerian soldiers in Imo State, a state in the South-East geopolitical zone of Nigeria, are doing the rounds on social media. The photos include that of a burning car, a raging fire in a congested area, and a helicopter. If social media is to be believed, the viral photos show a recent attack in the Orsu Local Government Area (LGA) where houses and other property were destroyed.
People shared the photos on Twitter claiming, “SAD NEWS: Nigerian Soldiers Reportedly Invade Orsu LGA In Imo State, Burn Over 40 Houses, Cars, Other Properties And Some Youths Were Killed.”
Archives of these posts can be found here, here and here.
AFWA found that all three photos were old, some shared as early as 2009. We investigated the viral photos one by one.
Upon reverse-searching the photo of the massive fire in a jam-packed area on Tineye, we found that it had been shared online as early as December 2013.
Google reverse search of this photo took us to a YouTube video shared by Davas Media, a Ghana-based news outlet. The video was titled, “Fire Outbreak In Kumasi Central Market Destroys Properties Worth Millions Of Cedis”. The thumbnail of this video was the same as the viral photo.
Further searches led us to a Research Gate paper titled “The trends of fire outbreaks in Ghana and ways to prevent these incidences”. According to it, the photo showed a fire outbreak in the Kumasi Central Market on December 30, 2012.
