Claim: Nhyira 104.5FM has posted two videos on Facebook of young men being flogged, with a claim that they are homosexuals.
Dubawa has analyzed the videos and has found the claim to be false.
Full Text
On Tuesday, February 1, 2022, a verified Facebook page, Nhyira 104.5FM posted two 30-seconds videos on its platform.
In the separate videos which may appear inappropriate or offensive to some viewers , two young men, who were topless, with their arms and legs wrapped around a pillar were subjected to heavy flogging in the presence of onlookers.
The caption given by Nhyira 104.5FM reads, “alleged gay partners flogged mercilessly in public.”
The two videos have an average of 720.5K views, 2.5K comments, 5.8K reactions, and have been shared 2.4K times.
Verification
To authenticate the claim, we took a screenshot and did a Google Reverse Image Search to help discover similar images on the web.
There were several matching images that came up in the search.
These included images similar to the video content published on Facebook by Nhyira 104.5
In a 2021 publication on newsnaira.net, the photo was used among several others to narrate how young people were flogged in Imo State, Nigeria, for taking ‘Mkpuru Mmiri’ drugs. It was also used in another opinion article, published on 774ngr.com, highlighting the usage of Crystal Meth among the youth in Iglo land in Nigeria, and the “unorthodox method to curb the menace.”
A YouTube video, uploaded in November 2021 contained visuals of young people being flogged for using the drug.
A naijanews.com publication in November 2021, which used the same image also mentioned the use of the drug and made reference to how young people in Nigeria were flogged to serve as a deterrent to others.
A Facebook user, Millionzz Icehood, also shared the same videos in a Group. The description for the video indicated that the youth were punished by a vigilante team for drug abuse.
Another page on Facebook, Ndi Igbo, has several such videos, all related to incidents where young people in Nigeria were flogged as punishment for using the Mkpuru Mmiri’ drugs.
When DUBAWA contacted a reporter at Premium Times, Nigeria, QueenEsther Iroanusi to confirm whether there are instances where people are publicly flogged for abusing drugs in Igboland, she said:
“I spoke to a few friends I have in the South East and whilst they are saying that people who abuse these substances are publicly flogged, they do not know of any case where people were flogged for being homosexuals. There is a high chance that the people who were being flogged in the video were being flogged for abusing the substance and not homosexuality,” she said.
What is Mkpuru Mmiri?
Mkpuru Mmiri is an Igbo slang for Crystal Methamphetamine. The drug is described in an article published on punchng.com by Edith Nkem as an “extremely potent and addictive stimulant that affects the central nervous system and several other systems of the body.”
A November 2021 article on vanguardngr.com indicated that many Igbo communities were “currently facing the dangerous effect of the use of the drug.”
There is also a publication on allafrica.com highlighting the escalation of the use of the drug among Nigeria’s youthful population.
Conclusion
The young men who were flogged in the videos posted by Nhyira 104.5FM could not have been because they were homosexuals.
