Ethiotime1
The post leads to a text on a meeting between Ethiopian President Sahle-work Zewude and Orthodox archbishops.
This Facebook post claiming to contain a link to Oromia regional state president Shimelis Abdisa’s harsh response to artiste Teddy Afro’s remarks on the crisis in the Orthodox Tewahedo Church has a FALSE HEADLINE.
“Breaking News: the Oromia regional state president Shimelis Abdisa has been offended by the nasty comment made by Teddy Afro about the Oromia Orthodox synod yesterday and harshly responded to him,” the post in Afaan Oromoo reads in part.
“We thank him. This is what Oromos are looking for. Please watch the amazing response that president Shimelis Abdisa has given to Teddy Afro by clicking on the link below,” the post adds.
An image of armed people in military uniform is attached.
Tewodros Kassahun, also known by stage name Teddy Afro, is an Ethiopian musician.
On 4 February 2023, Teddy commented on the crisis in the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church on his official Facebook page.
Teddy wrote in Amharic. “I strongly condemn the recent harassment of our ancient Holy Church and the satanic deeds of dividing the Holy Synod”
PesaCheck reviewed the link and found it leads to a website with a text on a meeting between Ethiopian Federal Government President Sahle-work Zewde and Orthodox Tewahedo Church archbishops.
The website has a cover image of the archbishops, Teddy Afro and Afaan Oromo singers. The Afaan Oromo text accompanying the image translates to; “Teddy Afro has been ashamed”.
The text claims that Shale-work has allied himself with Amhara archbishops, defying the Oromia and Nations and Nationalities synod.
PesaCheck has investigated a Facebook post that claims to provide a link to a video showing Oromia regional state president Shimelis Abdisa harshly responding to artiste Teddy Afro over the dispute in Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo church and finds it to have a FALSE HEADLINE.
This post is part of an ongoing series of PesaCheck fact-checks examining content marked as potential misinformation on Facebook and other social media platforms.
By partnering with Facebook and similar social media platforms, third-party fact-checking organizations like PesaCheck are helping to sort fact from fiction. We do this by giving the public deeper insight and context to posts they see in their social media feeds.
Have you spotted what you think is fake news or false information on Facebook? Here’s how you can report. And, here’s more information on PesaCheck’s methodology for fact-checking questionable content.
This fact-check was written by a PesaCheck fact-checker based in Ethiopia (name withheld for security reasons) and edited by PesaCheck senior copy editor Cédrick Irakoze and acting chief copy editor Francis Mwaniki. The article was approved for publication by PesaCheck’s managing editor Doreen Wainainah.
PesaCheck is East Africa’s first public finance fact-checking initiative. It was co-founded by Catherine Gicheru and Justin Arenstein, and is being incubated by the continent’s largest civic technology and data journalism accelerator: Code for Africa. It seeks to help the public separate fact from fiction in public pronouncements about the numbers that shape our world, with a special emphasis on pronouncements about public finances that shape government’s delivery of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) public services, such as healthcare, rural development and access to water / sanitation. PesaCheck also tests the accuracy of media reportage. To find out more about the project, visit pesacheck.org.
PesaCheck is an initiative of Code for Africa, through its innovateAFRICA fund, with support from Deutsche Welle Akademie, in partnership with a coalition of local African media and other civic watchdog organizations.
GIPHY App Key not set. Please check settings