Michael AndeyinOn Sunday, Tokunbo Wahab, the Lagos State Commissioner for Environment and Water Resources, shared a 33-second video of a flooded restaurant on X.
While captioning this video he shared at 6:56 pm, Wahab wrote, “Yesterday in Athens, Greece.” The video has since sparked outrage among X users who claim that the commissioner shared the video to justify the ongoing flooding problem Lagos is faced with.
In the video, bar stools and garbage cans were seen being swept away by the flood. People also huddled under a shed as the flood swept along.
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Yesterday in Athens , Greece. pic.twitter.com/UP6Rpv7HcY— Tokunbo Wahab (@tokunbo_wahab) November 24, 2024
X users like this, this, this and this challenged Wahab’s poor attempt at comparing the flooding in Athens to the one in Lagos.
One of them, Funsho Omojuyigbe, said “How did we get here? How did we have educated dunces to run our affairs? Look at what a lawyer and commissioner is posting. Who is this dolt for God sake!”
The post had garnered over 890,000 views, over 480 comments, 617 likes and 132 bookmarks at press.
However, FIJ has found the commissioner’s claim of a flood occurring in Athens on Saturday to be misleading.
How did we get here sef? How did we have educated dunces run our affairs? Look at what a lawyer and commissioner is posting. Who is this dolt for God sake! https://t.co/iuVqYswZKG— Funsho E. Omojuyigbe (@funshodarq1) November 25, 2024
CLAIM
Athens experienced flooding on Saturday, November 23.
VERIFICATION
To verify the accuracy of Wahab’s X post, FIJ first did a reverse image search using Google Lens. This search led to several Instagram and Facebook pages which had shared the same video.
From all these pages, FIJ gathered that the flooding was caused by Storm Atena, which was predicted to hit the city in September. The earliest videos of the same footage shared by Wahab were shared in the same month.
The earliest post with the video FIJ found was from September 10. This was shared by Greekcitytimes, an Instagram blog page, reporting on the city.
Other Instagram pages published the video on September 13, September 13 and September 15.
Also, the Facebook video AgnStar shared was published on the page on September 16.
When FIJ checked for reports on flooding in Athens, the majority of the incidents were documented in August and September. None of them reported a flood on Saturday as claimed by the Lagos commissioner.
THETOC, a media platform in Greece, also reported the same incident on September 11. It stated that the flooding happened in Maraslis, Kolonaki, a neighbourhood in Athens.
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CONCLUSION
Wahab’s claim that the footage he shared was from a flood that happened on Saturday is false.
VERDICT
Wahab’s post on the flooding in Greece on Saturday is false and misleading.
The post FACT-CHECK: Lagos Commissioner Tokunbo Wahab Shares Misleading Post on Athens Flood appeared first on Foundation For Investigative Journalism.
