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How fake news put me in trouble with my wife – Osinbajo

Published

6 years ago

January 9, 2019

Vice – President Yemi Osinbajo has lamented the negative effect of fake news , adding that it even put him in some trouble with his wife recently.Osinbajo , while speaking at a BBC symposium on fake news tagged , ‘ Nigeria 2019 : Countering Fake News ’ , in Abuja on Wednesday , said a blog put up a picture depicting him posing with strippers .

The Vice – President said upon closer inspection of the photo , he discovered that he had indeed taken a picture with the women at an entertainment event but they were fully clothed .

He said the blogger picked a photo of where the women were not fully clothed and presented it to the public wrongly .

Osinbajo said , “ I have been one of the targets of fake news . It can also sometimes cause you marital peace . I got a call from my wife about three or four weeks ago and she said Yemi what are you doing with strippers and I said what do you mean by strippers ? So , I read a story in a famous blog that said , ‘ Osinbajo caught with strippers ’ .

“ And there was a photograph of me sitting between two perfectly clothed ladies but underneath this picture , the same ladies were not wearing much .

“ In fact – checking ( I noticed that ) the photographs with these two ladies at an entertainment event were taken when they were perfectly clothed but by the time the story was put out , it was as though I had taken a photo with them at the time they were not clothed at all .

“ As it turns out , I wasn ’ t in the picture of where they were not wearing clothes but just the caption , the stories and all that gave the impression that here I was in the company of these ladies at a point when they were doing their business . I think the capacity of fake news to cause great harm is not in doubt at all . ”

The Vice – President said fake news is as old as communication but added that there was a need to effectively tackle it as it could cause violence and destroy lives .