A viral ‘leaked’ audio purporting to be a phone conversation between the outgoing governor of Rivers state, Nyesom Wike, and the former governor of Ekiti state, Ayodele Fayose, is making the rounds on social media.
Simon Ekpa, a Finnish-Nigerian separatist, calling for the independence of Biafra, posted the said conversation on Twitter, claiming that Wike and Fayose were discussing how they killed people during elections.
This is coming on the heels of the controversies that have clouded the outcome of the just concluded 2023 presidential and national assembly elections, following the agitations by opposing parties, challenging the conduct of the February 25 polls.
The audio, posted on Monday, March 6, 2023, has since generated over 18k impressions, 4,992 views, 1,122 retweets, and 1,103 likes as of when it was retrieved from the microblogging platform.
Ekpa’s caption read, “This is an audio leak of a serving governor of River State Wike and past governor of Ekiti state Fayose, discussing how they killed their people during election. Wike said he ordered his gunmen to kill anyone and anything that tries to stop them rigging election.”
He further claimed in the comment section of the post, “the same Wike massacred thousands of Biafrans during EndSARS in Obigbo in 2020. Corpse of Biafra agitators were seen floating in Obigbo river in 2020.
In the one-minute six-second audio posted by Ekpa, Wike could be heard laughing intermittently, saying, “Ayodele my son….Nigerian Army does not exist again now..”
“Wike, you bad. Everybody has been calling me…You faced the whole country’s military. They were shooting where you went to?” Fayose was heard saying.
Claim: Leaked conversation show Wike and Fayose discussing how both governors killed people during the February 25 elections.
Verification
CDD Election War Room checked to verify the veracity of the claim and found it to be false.
The viral audio conversation shows the logo of SaharaTV, so we checked further and traced the longer version to YouTube.
We found that SaharaTV posted the ‘leaked conversation’ on December 29, 2016 – six years ago.
It was captioned, “Audio leak: Gov. Wike and Gov. Fayose celebrate how Wike overrun collation center during Rivers rerun.”
Sahara Reporters reported here that Wike and Fayose were mocking the Nigerian Army in the said leaked conversation.
It was also reported by Dailypost and Newsbreak as seen here and here.
Verdict
The claim by Simon Ekpa that the leaked phone conversation shows Wike and Fayose discussing how they killed people during the February 25 polls is false; findings revealed that the leaked audio has been on the Internet since 2016, six years ago and has nothing to do with the 2023 election.