A screenshot of what seems to be a tweet sent by Kenya’s opposition leader Raila Odinga on 4 January 2020 has been posted on Facebook.
“I will be leaving NASA to join Jubilee,” it reads. “President Uhuru Kenyatta agreed with me. Therefore I'm insisting DP Ruto to form his own party and give me chance to join jubilee.”
Odinga’s National Super Alliance, Nasa, is the opposition coalition, and Jubilee is Kenya’s ruling party. William Ruto is the country’s deputy president.
Kenyatta and Odinga seem to have had a political reconciliation recently. Ruto has been reported to be increasingly isolated within the Jubilee Party, with calls for him to quit.
Did Odinga really tweet this? We checked.
There are a number of hints that the tweet might be fake, created with an image editing app.
In a real tweet, the time is usually given in full. On a web browser, the time would show as “3:03 AM”, and on a mobile phone as “3:03”.
But in this tweet the time is written as “3.3 AM”.
Another hint that the tweet is fake is how the number of “likes” and “retweets” are displayed. On Twitter, thousands are shown with the letter “K”.
Instead of “2369 Retweets” and “7072 Likes”, a real tweet would show “2.3K Retweets” and “7.1K Likes”.
We could not find the tweet when we searched for it on Twitter, and Odinga did not tweet on 4 January 2020.
The opposition leader has not said he would be joining the Jubilee Party. – Dancan Bwire
“I will be leaving NASA to join Jubilee,” it reads. “President Uhuru Kenyatta agreed with me. Therefore I'm insisting DP Ruto to form his own party and give me chance to join jubilee.”
Odinga’s National Super Alliance, Nasa, is the opposition coalition, and Jubilee is Kenya’s ruling party. William Ruto is the country’s deputy president.
Kenyatta and Odinga seem to have had a political reconciliation recently. Ruto has been reported to be increasingly isolated within the Jubilee Party, with calls for him to quit.
Did Odinga really tweet this? We checked.
Image manipulated
There are a number of hints that the tweet might be fake, created with an image editing app.
In a real tweet, the time is usually given in full. On a web browser, the time would show as “3:03 AM”, and on a mobile phone as “3:03”.
But in this tweet the time is written as “3.3 AM”.
Another hint that the tweet is fake is how the number of “likes” and “retweets” are displayed. On Twitter, thousands are shown with the letter “K”.
Instead of “2369 Retweets” and “7072 Likes”, a real tweet would show “2.3K Retweets” and “7.1K Likes”.
No evidence on Twitter
We could not find the tweet when we searched for it on Twitter, and Odinga did not tweet on 4 January 2020.
The opposition leader has not said he would be joining the Jubilee Party. – Dancan Bwire
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[email protected]: The challenges of working across Africa
Misinformation knows no borders and Africa Check often responds to similar false claims from country to country.
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