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Claim: Ivory Coast’s military chief, General Lassina Doumbia, was shot dead on Tuesday, May 20, 2025, after a meeting with the Defence Minister, Téné Ouattara.
Verdict: False! General Lassina Doumbia was seen at a public function on Wednesday, May 21, 2025, and all websites cited as the source of the information about his supposed death have denied the claims.
Full Text
Since Tuesday, May 20, 2025, news reports have gone viral on social media claiming that Ivory Coast’s Military Chief, General Lassina Doumbia, has been shot dead.
The posts, such as those published here, here, and here, claim that the army chief had just ended a meeting with the Minister for Defence, Téné Birahima Ouattara, when his vehicle was shot at by unknown assailants, leading to his death.
The post has since attracted several thousand reactions across Facebook and X (formerly Twitter).
Verification
Advanced searches conducted by DUBAWA revealed that some sources cited for sharing the information have issued disclaimers and retractions. Abidjan Plus, a Facebook page with over 600,000 followers who previously shared the information, has retracted.
Their retraction post said,
“After verification with the Bureau of Information and Press of the Army (BIPA), it is confirmed that General Lassina Doumbia is alive and fully functioning. The publication in question, falsely announcing his “tragic death”, comes from an unidentified third party as a reliable source. We acknowledge our mistake in picking up this false information without necessary verification.
“We express our deep regret for the inconvenience this may have caused, and we reiterate our apologies to the institutions involved and to our followers. [Translated from French via Facebook.]”
Also, Abidjan.net, a news website cited in the viral posts as the source of the information, has denied making any such publications. DUBAWA confirmed through references on the Wayback Machine that no such publication had been made on the website.
Besides stating that it “has never relayed such information,” Abidjan.net, in a publication, quoted Ivory Coast’s l’Agence Nationale de la Sécurité des Systèmes d’Information (ANSSI) as debunking the claim of General Lassina Doumbia’s death as false.
Further searches conducted by DUBAWA within the Ivorian media showed that General Lassina Doumbia was present at a public event at Adjamé in Abidjan on Wednesday, May 21, 2025, a day after his supposed death.
A news report by Afriksoir and a video from Abidjan.net on the event indicate that General Lassina Doumbia joked about the rumours about his death at the event.
“I saw some people looking at me this morning with a lot of amazement. I had promised the Colonel Major, GSPM Commander, to arrange my programme to be present, so I couldn’t afford the luxury of waiting 3 days to be resurrected. [French to English translation via Facebook]” General Doumbia said.
Conclusion
The claim that Ivorian army chief General Lassina Doumbia was shot dead is false. All news websites cited as the source of the information have issued disclaimers to indicate that the viral claim is untrue. The army chief also appeared hale and hearty at a public event in Abidjan, a day after his supposed death.
