By Mr. Tharyeh
A series of images shared by the official spokesperson for All Progressive Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council, Festus Keyamo on Twitter shows an overcrowded image from the APC Presidential Campaign rally in Sokoto.
Keyamo via his verified Twitter handle, @fkeyamo stated “Massive turnout of party faithful and supporters of @officialABAT in Sokoto and @OfficialAPCNg. Are you still in doubt? Please join the train now before it leaves the station. Note: Sokoto is a @OfficialPDPNig controlled state”.
The post, which was posted on February 9 has been viewed more than a million times on Twitter, retweeted 619 times, quoted tweets 674 times, 3191 likes.
The claim, which was also posted by the Chief Press Secretary to Lagos State Governor, Gboyega Akosile via his Twitter handle, @gboyegaakosile.has been viewed more than two thousand nine hundred and seventy-two (2972) times and garnered 27 retweets, 4 quoted tweets, 83 likes and more than 54 comments.
Background
Bola Tinubu, the APC’s presidential candidate, visited Sokoto state today in advance of the presidential election, which is scheduled for February 25. In order to meet with Alhaji Sa’ad Abubakar III, the Sultan of Sokoto, he was joined by President Muhammadu Buhari and other prominent members of the ruling party.
CLAIM
The first overcrowded images shared by Festus Keyamo on social media are from the APC Presidential Campaign rally in Sokoto.
FINDINGS
Findings by Fact Check247 show that the claim is false.
The first image was subjected reverse image search using Tineye, a digital tool used to search the source of an image and visually similar images from the internet and was traced to the 2021 Lollapalooza festival in Chicago, United States.
The Findings revealed that the aerial image was taken by Colin Hinkle, @hinklecolin an aerial photographer on July 31, 2021, at a 4-Day music festival in Chicago, United States known as Lollapalooza.
The photograph depicts a densely packed sea of concertgoers, with very few spectators wearing masks, according to an interview with the photographer Colin Hinkle that was published by Business Insider Africa and Yahoo on August 3, 2021.
In the interview, Hinkle stated that his main line of work is aerial photography, which involves using drones or helicopters to take pictures or video from the air.
In response to a question regarding his connection to the Lollapalooza festival, he stated: “That’s actually shot off the balcony of where I live. I reside on the 52nd story of a structure that views Grant Park and sits directly above Lollapalooza. Every year, I’m generally in the area on that weekend, so I buy a camera with a large zoom lens, shoot pictures, and post them.
He further said “What I wanted to try to capture this year was while they have all their restrictions in place for this event, I knew that a large group of people in one space was kind of contradicting all of the rules and regulations that were being told I wanted to try to show how many people were in one space at one time there, so I was trying to get a shot as many as I could showing the massive crowds all compacted together in very tight spaces.”
VERDICT
The Image shared by official spokesperson for All Progressive Congress (APC) Presidential Campaign Council, Festus Keyamo and also posted by Gboyega Akosile, the Chief Press Secretary to Lagos State Governor, Babajide Sanwo Olu is not from the APC presidential campaign rally in Sokoto. Therefore the claim overcrowded image is Misleading.
