Adeyemi Okediran
An image has gone viral on the internet claiming that the former President of the United States of America, Barack Obama has unveiled former Imo Governor, Rochas Okorocha’s presidential campaign banner for the 2023 election.
In the image shared, President Barack Obama was seen standing alongside a man while the proclaimed banner was standing tall in their middle.
POTENTIAL IMPACT OF THE CLAIM
Nigeria is in the build-up to the 2023 general election and many contestants from various parties have declared their interest to occupy the apex seat of the Nigerian government.
It is important to fact-check this claim, to know if truly President Obama has declared his support for Rochas Okrochas as claimed in the image shared.
Rochas Okorocha is a senator representing Imo West Senatorial district at the 9th Nigerian Senate. He is also the former governor of Imo State and has contested for the presidency several times.
CLAIM
N-VA extracted the claim “President Obama unveil Rochas Okorocha’s 2023 Presidential Campaign banner” and went on to fact-check and verify its authenticity.
VERIFICATION
In a bid to fact-check how authentic the claim is, the researcher used a couple of reverse image search engines to verify the picture.
According to Tineye, it was discovered that the images have been doctored, as the image in between Obama and the other man standing is a portrait of the former president of the United States of America, Barack Obama.
According to the tweet that was shared by American filmmaker, Ava DuVernay, there were four images of the former president of the United States of America, Barack Obama, and the former first lady, Mitchell Obama, in the tweet and the captioned reads “Monday morning joy as portraits of President and First Lady Obama are revealed by artists Amy Sherald and Kehinde Wiley. Reminds me to hope. # Obama Portraits.”
It was noted that the image first appeared on the Internet on February 12, 2018, when it was tweeted by DuVernay.
In the quest to get more details on the image, the researcher visited the website link inscribed at the bottom of the image. It happens to be Rochas Okorocha’s campaign website and there was no picture or press release on the site on Obama supporting or unveiling Okorocha’s campaign banner.
However, the researcher also found a video on YouTube on the Smithsonian channel where a full version of the event where the portraits were unveiled was uploaded. The video had the title, “Obama Portrait Unveiling at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery.”
The description on the YouTube video reads: “The Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery unveils its commissioned portraits of former President Barack Obama and Mrs. Michelle Obama by artists Kehinde Wiley and Amy Sherald, respectively. Remarks by President Obama and Mrs. Obama, Smithsonian Secretary David Skorton, National Portrait Gallery Director Kim Sajet, and artists Wiley and Sherald.”
https://youtube.com/watch?v=uX8muQOfzqA%3Ffeature%3Doembed
CONCLUSION
The image shared that President Obama unveiled Rochas Okorocha’s 2023 presidential campaign banner is FALSE as the image was doctored.
