The Guardian newspaper has concluded that an image shared online by opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to show Nigerian soldiers killed by Boko Haram in an attack on a military base in Metele, Borno State, is fake and misleading.
“After a series of checks of the image of several dead soldiers lying on the ground uploaded by PDP is not only phoney but also fake as it does not relate to Boko Haram or Nigeria.
“Our findings showed that the image was snapped by a photography stringer for Associated Press at Elasha Biya, Somalia.
“The image was published by the Associated Press on October 20, 2011, to show Al-Shabab militants displaying the bodies of men they claimed were African Union peacekeepers killed in Somalia.”
On November 18, a faction of Boko Haram, Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP), attacked the 157 Task Force Battalion and killed scores of Nigerian troops.
The Chief of Army Staff, Tukur Buratai, on Wednesday said only 23 soldiers were killed and also put the number of troops wounded in action at 31.
While there were no official casualty figures of the attack until after ten days, some media outlets, including London-based newswire Reuters, reported that over 100 soldiers were killed.
While reacting to the brutal attack, PDP shared on its official Twitter page a press statement accompanied with an image of President Muhammadu Buhari and an image of several dead Soldiers laid on the ground.
As at the report time, the tweet which is still up on PDP Twitter account, has 1,155 Retweets and 1,618 Likes.
