On October 1, 2023 the Collaborating Political Party of Alexander B. Cummings held a political rally at the Antoinette Tubman Stadium in Monrovia. Alexander B. Cummings is one of 20 presidential candidates contesting the presidency in the pending October 10 elections.
While the political rally was ongoing on Sunday, October 1, supporters, and non-supporter of Mr. Cummings began sharing photos while claiming that the photos were images from the rally at the ATS.
The Claim
One of many persons who shared images with claims that they were taken at the ATS was Mr. Musa Hansan Bility, who is the Chairman of Liberity Party – one of two political parties that make up the CPP and also a Representative candidate in Nimba County.
Mr. Bility made a Facebook post with an image and a caption: “ATS hang in there, the calvary is coming”.
Few minutes after he made the post, Mr. Bility then deleted the Facebook post. But the same photo shared by Mr. Bility continues to make its way on Facebook, with those sharing the same photos claiming that they were taken at the rally at ATS.
Another person who shared the same image was Menipakei Dumoe – a ranking member of the CPP. Dumoe shared the same image and few new ones in a Facebook post with a caption: “This is how we say shut up in a fixer language”.
Rating Justification
To verify the images shared by Bility and Dumoe in their Facebook posts, we conducted a reverse image search of the photos.
Results from our search shows that the images shared by Bility and Dumoe surfaced online since September 5, 2023.
A Twitter user shared the same images that were shared by both Bility and Dumoe on September 5, 2023 stating that the photos were meant “to tell Ugandans the truth”.
Another Twitter user also shared the images, claiming that they were taken from a gathering of people who came out to support Uganda politician Bobi Wine.
Also, on September 5, 2023 a Facebook user shared the images in a Facebook post in connection to the same Uganda politician.
They were images from a gathering of people who came to welcome the Ugandan politician.
Conclusion
Based on these facts, we therefore conclude that the images shared by Bility and Dumoe are not images from the rally at ATS. They are photos taken on September 5, 2023 from a crowd that welcomed Uganda politician Bobi Wine in a Uganda town of Iganga and not the CPP rally of October 1, 2023 at the ATS. The posts are misleading.
Local Voices Liberia, in partnership with the United Nations Development Programme, has implemented the iVerify Liberia system with the objective of strengthening capacities to address threats to information integrity, especially in view of the upcoming 2023 elections, to ensure all Liberian citizens have access to credible, reliable and verified information, everywhere and at all times.
This initiative is funded by Irish Aid, Embassy of Sweden in Monrovia, European Union Delegation in Liberia and the United Nations Peacebuilding Fund. The donors have no say in the production of this fact check report.
