HOAX: Congolese Musician Koffi Olomide is not dead
A recent article claiming that the Congolese musician has passed away appears to be an identical copy of a similar post from 2017
A post shared on Facebook alleging that Congolese legendary musician Koffi Olomide is dead is FALSE.
The post was published to Hivipunde.com on 6 February 2019 alleging that the Lingala musician died after a short illness.
This is not the first time that an online publication has published false news alleging that Koffi Olomide is dead. The story was previously published on thet1mes.com, a site that describes itself as ‘the worlds [sic] number one website’.
The website has since been shut dow, but it appears that the story was picked up by news aggregator site Trendolizer.com in 2017, leading the musician to dispel rumours of his alleged death. The current story appears to have been lifted word for word from the 2017 story on thet1mes.com, with only the age of the musician being updated from 60 to 62.
A scrutiny of Olomide’s Facebook page reveals that the musician is alive and active on social media, having posted a short video of himself on February 6 and an image on February 7.
PesaCheck has looked into the claim that Congolese musician Koffi Olomide is dead and finds it to be FALSE.
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 James Okong’o, was edited by PesaCheck Content Editor Ann Ngengere and was approved for publication by PesaCheck managing editor Eric Mugendi.
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 a joint initiative of Code for Africa, through its innovateAFRICA fund, with additional funding support from the International Budget Partnership (Kenya) and Twaweza, in partnership with a coalition of local media organisations, and the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ).
