An image of Peter Obi, the presidential candidate of Labour Party in the 2023 general election and Mr Musiliu Akinsanya known as M.C. Oluomo, the newly elected National President of National Union of Road Transport Workers, NURTW, has been circulating on X with a claim that Obi visited MC Oluomo to work with him as the NURTW National president.
@GoriconC, an X user posted the picture on November 12, 2024 with the caption: “Breaking: Peter Obi pays homage to Oluomo, vows to work with him as the new NURTW National President!”
The claim has gathered over about 310,000 views, 725 replies, 308 retweets and quotes, about 2,000 likes, and 56 bookmarks as of the time this report was published. The image has also appeared here, here, and here.
On November 10, Akinsanya was elected as the national president of the NURTW after emerging as the sole candidate. Premium Times, Sahara Reporters, The Punch Newspapers and Business Day had reported on this. Akinsanya is a well-recognised ally of President Bola Tinubu, so NV-A went on to verify the authenticity of the circulating image of him with Obi.
VERIFICATION
The image was subjected to Reverse Image Search, the results showed the image featuring Obi and others with only Akinsanya in the frame. One of the posts in the results was from an X user, @DeeoneAyekooto, the image posted on November 11, 2024 at 8:50 PM had only Akinsanya standing behind a framed picture of President Tinubu with the caption: “ To God be the glory.”
However, another result showed a Facebook post from My Impact Blog posted on the same day at 2:42 PM with the caption: “Congratulations to Mc Oluomo 
Also, a Nairaland post on M.C. Oluomo assuming office as new national president of NURTW had a YouTube video and screenshots which did not feature Obi. The YouTube video posted by Obashola Updates on November 11 showed people jubilating with Akinsanya as he entered the NURTW office but Obi was not captured in the video.
Further, a keyword search led to Guardian Nigeria’s YouTube channel with news updates from November 11, the news bulletin on Akinsanya featured the same image of him as he assumed office as NURTW President.
CONCLUSION
The claim that Obi visited the new NURTW President Musiliu Akinsanya is FALSE. Findings by NV-A revealed that the image was manipulated, Obi never appeared on the original image with the newly elected president of NURTW as claimed.
By Umoh Umoh Etop
