“Breaking News! Singapore released 500 thousand Nigerians on death row after Peter Obi pleaded on their behalf,” read messages circulating on Facebook in August 2022.
One version includes three photos of people behind bars, as well as a photo of Obi. The Labour Party politician is running for president in Nigeria’s February 2023 elections.
Another version shows what seems to be a tweet by Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed, Obi’s running mate, which makes the same claim.
But did Obi really get Singapore to release 500,000 Nigerians on death row?
Recycled photos, impersonated Twitter account
A reverse image reveals that one of the photos is from a makeshift detention centre for refugees in Libya. It appears in a 2015 article on Express, a UK-based news website.
A second image search shows that another of the photos is from a 2010 article about Rwandan prisons.
And our investigations revealed that Baba-Ahmed did not tweet the claim. Instead, the tweet is from an imposter account.
More than this, the claim hasn’t been reported by any credible media outlet.
Obi didn’t free 500,000 Nigerian prisoners in Singapore. The claim is false.
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