A photo posted on Instagram in Nigeria on 4 June 2020 shows former US president Barack Obama, his wife Michelle Obama and their daughters Sasha and Malia walking at the front of a huge crowd.
It’s captioned: “Former President Obama Leading the protest against the killing of blacks.”
Mass Black Lives Matter protests continue across the US and the world, sparked by the killing of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis, a city in the US state of Minnesota.
Does the photo show Obama and his family leading one of the protests?
A Google reverse image search reveals that the photo is more than five years old. It was taken on 7 March 2015 during a walk to mark the 50th anniversary of the 1965 march led by US civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr from the Alabama cities of Selma to Montgomery in a campaign for black Americans’ voting rights.
The Obama White House archives website credits the photo to former official photographer Lawrence Jackson.
Here its caption reads: “President Barack Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama and daughters Sasha and Malia wait with former President George W. Bush, former First Lady Laura Bush prior to the walking across the Edmund Pettus Bridge to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the Selma to Montgomery civil rights marches, in Selma, Alabama, March 7, 2015.”
Obama tweeted the photo on the day.
AFP Fact Check has debunked a similar post on Facebook that miscaptioned another photo of the 2015 event taken by AFP photographer Saul Loeb. – Allwell Okpi
It’s captioned: “Former President Obama Leading the protest against the killing of blacks.”
Mass Black Lives Matter protests continue across the US and the world, sparked by the killing of George Floyd by police officers in Minneapolis, a city in the US state of Minnesota.
Does the photo show Obama and his family leading one of the protests?
Photo from a 2015 march
A Google reverse image search reveals that the photo is more than five years old. It was taken on 7 March 2015 during a walk to mark the 50th anniversary of the 1965 march led by US civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr from the Alabama cities of Selma to Montgomery in a campaign for black Americans’ voting rights.
The Obama White House archives website credits the photo to former official photographer Lawrence Jackson.
Here its caption reads: “President Barack Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama and daughters Sasha and Malia wait with former President George W. Bush, former First Lady Laura Bush prior to the walking across the Edmund Pettus Bridge to commemorate the 50th Anniversary of the Selma to Montgomery civil rights marches, in Selma, Alabama, March 7, 2015.”
Obama tweeted the photo on the day.
AFP Fact Check has debunked a similar post on Facebook that miscaptioned another photo of the 2015 event taken by AFP photographer Saul Loeb. – Allwell Okpi
Republish our content for free
For publishers: what to do if your post is rated false
A fact-checker has rated your Facebook or Instagram post as “false”, “altered”, “partly false” or “missing context”. This could have serious consequences. What do you do?
Click on our guide for the steps you should follow.
Publishers guideAfrica Check teams up with Facebook
Africa Check is a partner in Meta's third-party fact-checking programme to help stop the spread of false information on social media.
The content we rate as “false” will be downgraded on Facebook and Instagram. This means fewer people will see it.
You can also help identify false information on Facebook. This guide explains how.
Add new comment