A video allegedly showing Ondo State Governor, Lucky Aiyedatiwa with the claim that he was in a brawl with an unidentified woman tagged as his mistress circulated on social media, earlier in the month.
On X, @DaveTorty posted the video on October 12, 2024 with a caption, “This is the Ondo State governor in London, having a real brawl with a side chic! What a shame! Men, honour Urselves! The real plan of the strange woman, spiritually and physically is to bring U down! Make thy loins tight! Keep thy prestige! A sitting Governor”.
Another X account, @whatsappblog9ja posted the same 2 minutes 20 seconds video on October 13, 2024 with the caption, “Viral video of Ondo State sitting governor in London, having a real brawl with a side chic #protest #peller Messi IELTS Jarvis T-Pain.”
This claim began circulating at the time when Aiyedatiwa is campaigning to become the next governor of Ondo state after serving out the term of his predecessor, Rotimi Akeredolu who died in December 2023 while in office. NV-A took a closer look at the video and here are our findings below.
VERIFICATION
The fact-checker took screenshots from the video for analysis. Despite a striking resemblance to Aiyedatiwa, the beards of the man in the video had a full connection on the right side compared with that of the governor which is sparsely connected on the right as it is on the left. This is a usual occurrence with some men.
The governor’s image below further shows that his beards are not as round or fully connected as that of the man in the video.
Meanwhile, the man in the video obviously has a diastema which is locally referred to as ‘open teeth’, which is not noticed with Governor Aiyedatiwa.
While analysing the audio content, it was observed that a voice in the background explained to someone intervening in the brawl saying, “This is her husband, this is her husband, you will not go…”, this implies that the fight is between a couple and not between a man and his ‘side chic’ as being speculated.
The governor’s Senior Special Assistant on Strategic Communication, Comrade Allen Sowore, released a statement clarifying it was not Aiyedatiwa in the video as the governor has never worked in the United Kingdom at any point in his life.
CONCLUSION
The claim that Governor Aiyedatiwa was in a brawl with his mistress is FALSE as findings revealed the man in the circulating video is not the governor