Fact-Check: Images Shared By Festus Keyamo To Depict Lagos-Ibadan Expressway Are ‘MISLEADING’

A picture posted by the Spokesperson of the Presidential Campaign Council of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC,  for the 2023 elections, Festus Keyamo, on the state of Lagos-Ibadan expressway is misleading, checks by THE WHISTLER have shown.

Keyamo had on the 26th of August 2022 posted a supposed picture of the Lagos-Ibadan expressway on his verified Twitter handle, eulogizing President Mohammadu Buhari’s administration for its infrastructural development efforts. Keyamo added that the APC candidate in the forthcoming presidential elections Bola Ahmed Tinubu will continue with the infrastructural resolution.

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The picture was a fusion of two images alleged to have been the state of the Lagos-Ibadan expressway when it was abandoned by the administration of former President Goodluck Jonathan and after it was constructed by the Buhari administration. 

A Google Lens search of the supposed deteriorating state of the Lagos-Ibadan Road in 2014 as claimed by Keyamo led us to an image used in a Channels TV report on September 5, 2012. The report identified the road as the Benin-Sagamu road.

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Similarly, a Google Lens search of the picture of the road claimed to have been completed by President Buhari showed that the image was first published on Nairaland on the 29th of September 2014. The image was published when former president Goodluck Jonathan commissioned the first phase of the Benin-Ore road.

A video posted by Channels TV on YouTube authenticated the originality of the photo as it was consistent with the event and pictures in the Nairaland post.

Also, a Google Street check on the Benin-Ore road had significant similarities with the photo as it contained the same markings and the road divider matched the one included in the said picture.  

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On the contrary, an analysis of several portions of the Lagos-Ibadan expressway on Google Street showed no similar landmarks to the picture.

In addition, the Lagos-Ibadan expressway is yet to be completed, although work is currently ongoing. The Minister of State for Works and Housing, Mu’azu Sambo had in May 2022 announced that the expressway would be commissioned in June 2022. However, the project is still not complete.

VERDICT: Festus Keyamo used the pictures of Benin Sagamu road and the  Benin-Ore Road to wrongly depict the Lagos-Ibadan expressway. The post is therefore MISLEADING.

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