In the wake of ongoing announcement of results from the October 10 elections by the National Elections Commission, a photo has surfaced online with claims that the Presidential candidate of the Grassroots Democratic Movement (GDM), Edward W. Appleton, has had a meeting with top campaign officials of the Coalition for Democratic Change.
The photo is edited with text pointed at one of the men in the photo, with a claim that he is Candidate Appleton meeting with leaders of the CDC campaign team.
The Claim
The exact text on the photo is: “That’s Appleton with magic votes! Now you know!”
We reviewed the screenshot and found that the image was shared by a Facebook user named Obed Obed. Our review of Obed Obed profile shows that the post was later deleted.
Rating Justification
Fact check the photo, we conducted a reverse image search but did not find any result to link the picture to a recent incident.
We also reviewed the image and found that the four men in the photo are Israel Akinsanya, a Commissioner of Liberia Telecommunications Authority (LTA), popular Facebook user, Waka Doe, the campaign Manager of the CDC Eugene Lenn Nagbe and Kanio Bai Gbala – the spokesman of the CDC campaign team.
The person who is claimed to be Candidate Appleton in the image is Mr. Waka Doe.
The person who is claimed to be Candidate Appleton of the GMD Party in the photo above is Waka Doe (second from left
A further search also shows that Waka Doe, the man who is tagged as Candidate Appleton in the edited photo, uploaded the picture as his Facebook profile photo on October 14, 2023.
Conclusion
Based on our research, we conclude that the photo making rounds on Facebook with claims that Presidential candidate Edward Appleton was seen with officials of the CDC campaign team is misleading.
The man in the photo is Mr. Waka Doe and not Edward Appleton of the Grassroots Development Movement.
This report was developed with the support of Internews through the USAID Media Activity project. The funder has no say in the editorial decision leading to the production of this content.
