FALSE: Some of these images are not from Uganda under the NRM leadership
A reverse image search shows the photos were taken in different African countries, and only two of them were captured in Uganda.
A Facebook post with photos claiming to show Uganda under the ruling party’s 35-year leadership is MISLEADING.
The post that was published on K Real TV’s Facebook page has an attachment of photos of deplorable conditions, with the claim that these all show the state of Uganda after 35 years of the National Resistance Movement’s (NRM) rule.
However, Google reverse image search on the first photo — showing a woman who appears to be giving birth on the street — reveals that the image is not from Uganda, but was actually taken in Ghana in October 2019, after a woman delivered a baby on Dambai Road in the Oti Region of Krachi East District in Ghana. The story and the photo were published by a number of Ghanaian media outlets, including StarrFm, GhanaLive, and The Independent (Ghana).
A reverse search on the second photo of a dilapidated road shows that it was first seen online in 2016 and is reportedly from Zimbabwe. The search results show the image was featured on a number of blogs, including SA-News.com, New Zimbabwe and OldgitsFunnies.
A search on the third photo of school children sitting in a classroom with a flooded floor shows it was taken in Kilifi County in Kenya after a flood in 2019. It was reported to be a photograph of children at Mangororomu Primary School in Ganze Constituency, Kilifi.
No results were available online for the fourth photo, that captured a road with worn-out shoulders.
An internet search of the fifth image of a muddy road that has been rendered almost impassible, shows it was first published on December 6, 2019, in the Daily Monitor, a Ugandan newspaper.
Reverse image results for the sixth photo of a crumbling road reveals it is actually a section of the Kabale-Katuna road in Western Uganda, after landslides reportedly caused the road to collapse. The photo was taken in May 2018.
PesaCheck has looked into images capturing deplorable conditions and claiming to show the state of Uganda under NRM’s 35-year rule and finds them to be MISLEADING.
This post is part of an ongoing series of PesaCheck fact-checks examining content marked as potential misinformation on Facebook and other social media platforms.
By partnering with Facebook and similar social media platforms, third-party fact-checking organisations like PesaCheck are helping to sort fact from fiction. We do this by giving the public deeper insight and context to posts they see in their social media feeds.
Have you spotted what you think is fake news or false information on Facebook? Here’s how you can report. And, here’s more information on PesaCheck’s methodology for fact-checking questionable content.
This fact-check was written by PesaCheck Researcher Sylvia Makinia and edited and approved for publication by PesaCheck News Editor Enock Nyariki.
PesaCheck is East Africa’s first public finance fact-checking initiative. It was co-founded by Catherine Gicheru and Justin Arenstein, and is being incubated by the continent’s largest civic technology and data journalism accelerator: Code for Africa. It seeks to help the public separate fact from fiction in public pronouncements about the numbers that shape our world, with a special emphasis on pronouncements about public finances that shape government’s delivery of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) public services, such as healthcare, rural development and access to water/sanitation. PesaCheck also tests the accuracy of media reportage. To find out more about the project, visit pesacheck.org.
PesaCheck is an initiative of Code for Africa, through its innovateAFRICA fund, with support from Deutsche Welle Akademie, in partnership with a coalition of local media and other civic watchdog organisations in 14 African countries.
