Juliet Buna
On February 17, 2023, a X user (formerly Twitter) with the username @ejykmykel1 posted a video purportedly showing Lagos women protesting naked and cursing Tinubu over the nation’s hardships.
The post has garnered significant attention with 300 reposts, 137 quotes, 414 likes, 97 bookmarks, and a staggering 761,000 views as of the time this report was published.
The song underlying the video which is in Yoruba outlined the current hardship in the country with emphasis on the prices of goods, staple foods, and services. However, there were replies under the comment section with questions about the authenticity of the video which prompted N-VA to fact-check the video.
VERIFICATION
The researcher took still images from the video play and extracted key frames from Invid WeVerify then uploaded them on Google images to do a reverse image search. The search results revealed that the video of the women protesting naked had been online before February, some of the said results revealed that the naked protest actually took place in Anambra State back in November 2023.
Further scrutiny of related links led to the report from reputable news agencies, The Punch and The Nation which detailed that the protest occurred in Anambra State on Wednesday, November 22, 2023. The protest was also covered by Nairaland, 247ureports and 9news Nigeria.
In these news reports, it stated that the demonstrations were sparked by growing anger over killings associated with cult activities in the Awka community, situated within the Awka South Local Government Area. Also, the original video from the pretest which first appeared on X in November 2023 revealed that the song being played in the background is an Igbo tune while the recent one that went viral had an accompanying Yoruba song.
CONCLUSION
The claim that Lagos women protested naked against President Tinubu over current hardships is MISLEADING, as the video has been online since November 2023 and falsely attributed the protest to Lagos when it actually took place in Anambra State.
