Claim: Delhi has launched the first underwater bus according to the Facebook page of Nsemkeka Radio.
The image in question shows the aftermath of heavy rains in the city and not an underwater bus.
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A Facebook user, Nsemkeka Radio, has posted an image suggesting that Delhi has launched an underwater bus. The post has generated 574 likes since it was posted on July 20, 2021.
Source: Facebook
Believing the post, some users have expressed disappointment in the government for not investing in such technology but rather investing in churches as evidenced by the comment below.
Others have stated that the post was meant for laughs.
Verification
Initial searches on the image revealed that the photo is of Minto Road in Delhi which has a railway bridge over it.
It has since been recirculated, showing this same image of a bus submerged in water along with different narration as well.
An example of its recirculation is linked to a claim that Monsoons had arrived in Delhi, posted on July 13th, 2021 on Twitter.
Source: Twitter
Newsmeter.in, an International Fact-checking Network (IFCN) accredited platform based in India ran a fact-check on a similar claim and rated it misleading.
The image is in fact an old one that has been in the news since July 2020 when heavy rains hit Delhi, resulting in flooding under the Minto Bridge, as reported by many online portals including The Indian Express.
According to presswire18, as of July 27th, 2021, rains have persisted in Delhi, however, Minto road or Minto bridge was not listed as being water flooded.
Conclusion
The image in question does not show an underwater bus. It is rather a photo from a flooding that took place in July 2020 in Delhi.
Twenty-two Liberian journalists drawn from the country’s print, broadcast and online press will begin a four-day training in fact-checking training at the Murex Plaza and Suites in Monrovia Wednesday 28 July where Deputy Minister for Information, Mr. Boakai Fofana, will open the event with an address on “Stemming the Spread of Misinformation in Liberia to Advance Good Governance and Democracy.”
The training is organized by the West African fact-checking initiative, DUBAWA, a project of the Premium Times Centre for Investigative Journalism (PTCIJ).
“We are honoured and privileged to be in Liberia to support our peers in executing this training on the global information crisis of misinformation and disinformation, and the challenges they pose to democracy, electoral integrity, public health and sound public policy in the country,” said Oluwatosin Alagbe, the Programme Director of PTCIJ in a statement Tuesday from Monrovia.
Ms. Alagbe said the training will be conducted in collaboration with The Stage Media, an indigenous Liberian fact-checking organisation, formed last year, and that the scope of the training will cover accountability journalism, theory and history of fact-checking, as well as the structure and ethics of the practice. Other skills trainees will acquire are: how to conduct a full-fledged fact-checking exercise; how to identify best sources for fact-checking; how to use multimedia verification tools for fact-checking and how to interpret data and understand numbers.
“We expect trainees from the programme to also learn how to use data and geolocation tools as well as the Freedom of Information Law to reinforce their fact checking practice,” said Ms. Alagbe, adding that the leadership of the Liberian Press Union, the Female Journalist Association, the Centre for Media and Society, the Accountability Lab, civil society captains and a string of officials from the diplomatic community will grace the occasion.
Liberia’s media has a strong tradition of promoting accountability since the 1826 founding of the Liberian Herald by Charles Force but fact-checking is recent with Stage media, and an erstwhile leader in rural journalism, Local Voices, which incorporated fact checking into its journalism earlier this year, helping to fight misinformation and promoting media literacy in the country.
Experts and facilitators that will conduct the training are: Dapo Olorunyomi, the Executive Director, Premium Times Centre for Investigative Journalism; Malcolm Joseph, Executive Director, Center for Media Studies and Peacebuilding; Adedeji Adekunle, Director, DUBAWA and Caroline Anipah, Programmes Manager, DUBAWA Ghana.
About DUBAWA
DUBAWA is a transnational verification and fact-checking platform, initiated by the Premium Times Centre for Investigative Journalism (PTCIJ) in 2018. It is independent, transparent and non-partisan and abides with the Code of Principles of the International Fact-checking Network (IFCN) to which it is a signatory.
Dubawa aims at instituting a culture of truth and verification in public discourse and journalism through strategic partnerships between the media, government, civil society organisations, technology giants and the public.
Since 2019, Dubawa has held successful annual fellowships for journalists, fact checkers and researchers in The Gambia, Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone to equip fellows with skills in fact-checking and verification in combating the wide spread regime of misinformation in the West African sub-region and to also contribute to knowledge around information disorder in the subregion.
For more about Dubawa visit dubawa.org and ghana.dubawa.org
Claim: A Twitter user claims that lack of sleep causes weight gain of 2 pounds (0.9 kg) in under one week.
Mostly true. Research confirms the assertion and a Dietician at Nyaho Medical Centre Dr. Frank Marfo has also affirmed that scientific evidence favors the assertion that sleep deprivation can contribute to weight gain. This is because one gets the appetite to eat more during the time one stays awake and this can lead to weight gain.
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A Twitter user @Fact claims that sleep deprivation leads to weight gain in under one week.
“Lack of sleep can cause weight gain of 2 pounds (0.9 kg) in under a week,” they posted.
The claim has sparked lots of conversation, leaving other users in a state of dilemma whether the claim is true.
The claim has been posted on several platforms, including Facebook and Pinterest.
It has garnered over 800 reactions on Twitter.
Photo Credit: Twitter
Verification
According to the National Sleep Foundation, healthy adults need between seven and nine hours of sleep each night. Babies, young children, and teens need even more sleep to enable their growth and development. People over 65 should also get seven to eight hours per night.
A dietician at the Nyaho Medical Centre, Dr. Frank Marfo, affirmed that the claim is true and that scientific evidence favors the assertion that sleep deprivation can contribute to weight gain.
“In our practice, we use evidence to make our conclusions. And looking at the scientific evidence, it is kind of favoring the assertion that sleep deprivation can lead to weight gain. When you deprive your body of sleep, there are a lot of imbalances. It can either go to the positive or negative sides. And this can lead to weight gain, so you get the appetite to eat more during the time you stay awake,” Dr. Marfo said.
Explaining further, Dr. Frank Marfo said there are several hormones like leptin and ghrelin that make sleep-deprived weight gain possible. He added that another hormone called cortisol, which is associated with stress and obesity, also makes it possible since the lack of sleep is associated with stress.
“The definition of sleep is also associated with increased stress levels. When you deprive yourself of sleep, you stress yourself because you always sleep late and wake up very early to work. So when your stress levels are high there is a hormone we call cortisol. This hormone is associated with increased stress and the same hormone is associated with obesity. So basically when you sleep less you stress yourself and this stress leads to obesity”.
The results of the study revealed that while staying awake longer did indeed require more energy, the extra calories burned were more than offset by the amount of food the study participants consumed.
Also quoted in the research, was Kenneth Wright, Director of CU-Boulder’s Sleep and Chronobiology Laboratory at the University of Colorado Hospital. According to him, getting less sleep, by itself, is not going to lead to weight gain, but when people get insufficient sleep, it leads them to eat more than they need – this may result in weight gain.
Moreover, a research article in Science Advances revealed that minor weekly shifts in sleep timing, or as few as five consecutive nights of short sleep, have been associated with an increased risk of weight gain in healthy humans.
Another research published by the National Center for Biotechnology Information indicated that short sleep duration was significantly associated with the incidence of obesity, whereas long sleep duration did not affect future obesity among adults.
How we gain weight when we don’t sleep
According to Michael J. Breus, a clinical psychologist and a diplomat of the American Board of Sleep Medicine and a fellow of the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, the lack of sleep that affects our ability to lose or gain weight has a lot to do with our nightly hormones.
The hormones key in these processes are ghrelin and leptin.
Ghrelin is the ‘go’ hormone that tells you when to eat. And when you are sleep-deprived, you have more ghrelin which means you will consume more food leading to your weight gain. Leptin is the hormone that tells you to stop eating. And when you are not sleep-deprived, you have less leptin, which means you eat less.
Thus, more ghrelin plus less leptin equals weight gain.
Other effects of Lack of Sleep
The cost of all sleepless nights is more than just bad moods and a lack of focus, according to the NHS.
The mental effects become more serious. Your brain will fog, making it difficult to concentrate and make decisions.
You’ll start to feel down, and may fall asleep during the day. Your risk of injury and accidents at home, work, and on the road also increases.
Lack of sleep can also affect your overall health and make you prone to serious medical conditions, such as obesity, heart disease, high blood pressure, and diabetes.
It, however, remains unclear exactly how much weight an individual stands to gain in under a week as indicated in the claim.
Conclusion
The claim that sleep deprivation leads to weight gain is mostly true. Research indicates that just getting less sleep, by itself, is not going to lead to weight gain, but when people get insufficient sleep, it leads them to eat more than they need which leads to weight gain. Also, a dietician at the Nyaho Medical Centre Dr. Frank Marfo confirmed that the imbalance caused when you don’t have enough sleep leads you to eat more, leading to weight gain.
This report was produced under the Dubawa Student Fact-checking Project aimed at offering students in tertiary schools aspiring to take up roles in the profession the opportunity to acquire real-world experience through verification and fact-checking.
Ghana’s place on the 2020 World Gold Chart has been deemed unsatisfactory by a cross section of the populace, especially with China retaining its place as one of the world’s top producers of the mineral.
They have raised questions as to why the country, formerly called the Gold Coast, whilst a British Colony, is not producing enough of the mineral to be the world’s leader.
Some of these assertions were made online after the Ghana Chamber of Mines released the 10 leading gold producing countries for 2020.
Reports from several online news publications sought to draw a link between illegal gold mining in Ghana and the country’s performance on the world’s list of major gold producers.
Indeed, the impact of illegal gold mining on the country cannot be overemphasized.
“While illegal mining supports livelihoods, it has caused severe damage to the environment. It is blamed for destruction of farmlands and pollution of water bodies. It also denies the state revenue: an estimated $2.3 billion in 2016,” parts of an article co-authored with Senyo Dotsey and Sebastian Paalo, PhD researcher, School of Political Science and International Studies, University of Queensland (Australia), and published on www.theconversation.com reads
But really, does the effects of galamsey extend to Ghana’s gold production?
If illegal mining is to be stopped, will the country’s volumes of the material increase?
How is galamsey affecting Ghana’s gold production?
The Director of Communications for Small-Scale Miners, Abdul Razak Alhassan, says that the effect of illegal gold may not influence the quantity of gold the country produces.
He has told Dubawa that illegal mining in the country cannot be the reason for Ghana’s inability to be the world’s leading producer of Ghana.
“Illegal mining is something we can discuss but not the cause of Ghana not being number one on the chart when it comes to leading producers of gold,” he said.
He added that Chinese were involved in gold mining activities across Africa, hence, it is quite wrong for Ghana to be the only country to be singled out by persons who hold the assertion that the presence of the Chinese was affecting the country’s gold production.
Abdul Alhassan says China’s rank on the 2020 leading gold producers chart is a reflection of their investment in the mining industry globally.
“If China is the leading gold producer, it means they have invested in the mining industry and they have invested in both their countries and other countries when it comes to gold. It is a fact that since colonial times, Ghanaian indigenes do not invest in its mining industries and most of the gold mining companies in Ghana are owned by foreigners. They invest in the mining companies and give the country just a token of the gross. It was 3% but now 5% of the gross. If we, Ghanaians, were investing in that sector and taking about 60% – 90%, it would have been a different ball game altogether, but if we do not channel our investment into that sector we will always have a minute percentage from the foreign companies,” he told Dubawa in an interview.
What should be done if the country wants to increase its gold production?
The government, at several times, announced policies geared at promoting growth of the mining sector.
In 2018, the then Deputy Minister for Lands and Natural Resources, Barbara Oteng Gyasi, said that the government was in the process of instituting policies aimed at restructuring the mining sector.
Concerning illegal mining, she only reiterated the government’s commitment to fighting the menace.
In the 2019 Mining in Africa Africa Country Investment Guide (MACIG), it was said that even though Ghana has led the way in gold mining and still holds first place in West Africa for gold production, “the country’s high tax burden has stalled many exploration projects and deterred new investors, leading to a lack of greenfield exploration.”
It added that “the country’s skew towards large companies with underground mines and brownfield exploration focus goes hand-in-hand with a mining code that favors companies with larger investment power.”
In the Magazine, President of the Ghana Chamber of Mines, Sulemanu Koney, was quizzed on how the country’s mining industry was taking shape in terms of investment and potential diversification and growth.
He is quoted to have said that “we see a lot of brownfield expansion and rebuilding of mines, but it would be beneficial to see an increase in greenfield investment in Ghana.”
He also said that there was the need for the country to attract more investment.
“Because of the high levels of resource exploitation and challenges in the fiscal regime, Ghana’s attractiveness is waning in comparison to neighboring countries and it is important for the country to reposition itself,” Sulemanu Koney is quoted to have said.
Abdul Razak Alhassan of the Small Scale Miners in Ghana believes that the country’s fortunes in gold production can change if there is more investment in the sector.
An article published on oxfordbusinessgroup.com seems to agree with Mr. Alhassan, stating that recent investments had boosted production of the resource in the country.
“Ghana is one of the world’s top-10 gold producers and the second largest in Africa. As such, the mining industry is a major economic driving force: it is the biggest single contributor to government revenues and a leading source of export earnings. A wave of investments in recent years has boosted production and improved cost efficiency in gold and manganese mining,”
But how did China become the World’s leading producer of Gold?
The World Gold Council, in a 2018 report, explained that China’s “exploration and production is spread across 3,389 gold mining areas, managed by around 400 gold mining companies.
Within this group, the top 13 account for the lion’s share of production, taking 59.77% and 41.04% of finished gold and total mined gold output, respectively. And the top four – China National Gold Group (‘China Gold’), Shandong Gold, Zijin Mining Group and Shandong Zhaojin Group – are dominant.”
The report added that “there is an increased focus across the industry on identifying quality assets, not just domestically but internationally too. Leveraging its position as “the largest gold smelter in the world,” the industry is actively seeking international partnerships and joint ventures.
This outward focus stems partly from an increased recognition of the benefits to be gained from cooperation with overseas peers, but it also reflects the role of gold within China’s “Belt and Road” (B&R) initiative.
For the Asian country to maximise its potential, it was suggested that “mining companies should drive exploration, increase investment in mining assets and cultivate existing resources to improve reserves and ensure the sustainable development of the industry more broadly.
Conclusion
Ghana’s production is hinged on investment. Should there be more local investments in the industry, such additional investment, according to experts, is sure to boost the country’s gold production. Illegal mining is definitely having a toll on the country but with discussions on how to increase Ghana’s gold production, the focus must be on more local investments.
This report was produced under the Dubawa Student Fact-checking Project aimed at offering students in tertiary schools aspiring to take up roles in the profession the opportunity to acquire real-world experience through verification and fact-checking.
Claim: A man reported himself to the police in Binduri, Upper East region after a bag of maize he stole refused to come off his head, social media users claim.
No such incident occurred in Binduri in Ghana. The incident dates back to 2018 and occurred in Tanzania.
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Viral photos circulating on various social media platforms in Ghana supposedly shows a thief reporting himself to police in Binduri in the Upper East Region after a bag of maize he stole refused to come off his head.
The photos have been circulating for several days and have been seen many times on Twitter, Facebook and WhatsApp.
“A thief at Binduri in the Upper East Region has handed himself over to the police after a bag of maize he stole refused to come down from his head… Ay3ka Face,” most of the captions read.
Verification
A Google Reverse Image search produced results of the same photos published on some websites years ago.
Website such as The Breaking Times in Nigeria, Matooke Republic in Uganda and Adomonline in Ghana all published the photos as far back as May 2018 with the same narrative that a thief had surrendered to the police after the bag of maize he stole failed to come off his head, except that, these reports pointed to Tanzania as the country the incident occurred in.
We found a YouTube video of the incident online capturing the same man in the viral photos. In the video, one of the standersby was heard speaking in Swahili, an official language of Tanzania.
Taking clues from one of the viral photos, we confirmed the name of a police officer and his phone number to have the codes of Tanzania and not Ghana.
Per the document, he was the police chief of the Mlandizi community in the Kibaha district of the Pwani Region in Tanzania.
The accompanying mobile phone number in the viral photo also points to a Vodacom network user in Tanzania.
Caller identification app, Truecaller also confirmed the telephone number listed on the board as the one to the office of Mr. Kahamba of the Officer Commanding Station at Mlandizi.
Dubawa also contacted the Upper East Regional Police Command to ascertain whether such a thing had happened. Public Relations Office of the Upper East Region Police, ASP David Fianko-Okyere, denied the reports. He said that no police station in the Region had arrested a suspected thief with a bag of maize refusing to come down from the head.
Further, Graphic Online says its checks with the Public Affairs Officer of the Upper East Regional Police Command, Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) David Fianko-Okyere and The Binduri District Chief Executive, Mr Ayinga Abagre Yakubu have confirmed that no such incident has occurred in the district.
Conclusion
The viral social media photos that supposedly shows a thief reporting himself to a police station in Biduri in the Upper East region of Ghana after a bag of maize he stole refused to come off his head is false.
The incident did not occur in Ghana but Tanzania. Again, it is not recent, it dates back to 2018.
Claim: England and Manchester United forward, Marcus Rashford is alleged to have made a post on Twitter calling English soccer fans stupid for “allowing monkeys to represent them” in reaction to recent online racist abuses.
The footballer made no such post. The photo being circulated that the footballer made such comments was manufactured. The contents of the write up was part of a statement that was made by a Twitter user identified as @michaelzigller1
Full Text
A photo being circulated on social media that appears to have been posted by England and Manchester United forward, Marcus Rashford, on Twitter.
Image: The photo that is being circulated purporting to be a tweet made by the footballer.
Verification
The first point of call to ascertain the truth of this post was to visit Rasford’s Twitter page.
The footballer indeed reacted to the racist abuse he was facing over England’s failure to win the trophy but his response was not what has been captured in the circulating photo.
We realized that it was part of a statement that was made by a Twitter user with the handle @michaelzigller1
That post was made as a comment to updates from AFP News Agency on the England vs. Italy game.
He wrote:
“You are stupid if you allow a Monkey to represent you but more stupid if you blame it on the Monkey. I thank all my Teammates for the support. Those monkeys represented the country from qualifiers to final. No wonders they lost. Over 50 years the so called white didn’t win”
All posts made on Twitter indicate that time and the date of the post. It also gives you the source of the post. At the bottom of the Tweet, you’ll see the label for the source of the account’s Tweet. For example, Twitter for iPhone, Twitter for Android, or Twitter for Web.
Another red flag that makes the post suspicious is the difference between the number of people who are said to have retweeted the post against those who did the quote retweet.
It is quite rare for posts made on Twitter to have more Quote Retweets than Retweets.
In fact, a report from Twitter suggests that more people are interested in amplification of content (Retweet) than add their own thoughts, reactions and perspectives to the conversation (Quote Retweet)
Whilst there is some possibility that Quote Retweets number can be more than the Retweet figure, the difference between those numbers in this alleged (270k) Rashford tweet is outrageous.
Rashford Tweet Impressions
The figures in the photo, representing the number of Retweets, Quote Retweets and Likes does not really represent the Tweet impressions that the footballer usually has for his posts.
Going through his posts so far for the month of July, none of them has over 200K likes.
Conclusion
It is not true that Marcus Rashford, the Manchester United and England forward made such a post in reaction to racist attacks he and some of his colleagues are facing online following their penalty misses.
The photo being circulated to suggest that he tweeted it was manufactured. The originator of the said post has been identified as @michaelzigller1 and that tweet can be found here.
This report was produced under the Dubawa Student Fact-checking Project aimed at offering students in tertiary schools aspiring to take up roles in the profession the opportunity to acquire real-world experience through verification and fact-checking.
Spouses of President Nana Addo Danquah Akufo-Addo and Vice President, Dr Mahamadu Bawumia will officially receive salaries, a departure from the previous practice of allowances paid to them.
This was announced by the Minister for information, Mr Kojo Oppong Nkrumah on Wednesday July 7, 2021.
The announcement has sparked lots of debate and ignited some sort of anger among Ghanaians on social media, with some questioning the basis for the payment.
While some are raising objections, others are in total agreement. A section of the public is also using the opportunity to misinform the public. In order to bring some clarity to the issues raised, Dubawa by this report presents the facts of the matter.
Which government introduced an emolument for presidential spouses? How did we get here?
A New Patriotic Party (NPP) government led by former President John Agyekum Kufour is said to have introduced the policy during the start of his presidency, according to the Information Minister, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah.
“President Kufuor, in his wisdom, instituted this because of the bad situations of some spouses of some former Heads of States then. Presidents Mills and Mahama even increased the rates of these benefits during their time,” Mr Oppong Nkrumah is reported to have said.
What does article 71 of the constitution say?
Article 71 clause 2 and 3 of the 1992 constitution as amended to 1996 stipulates that
“The salaries and allowances payable, and the facilities available, to the President, the Vice-President, the chairman and the other members of the Council of State; Ministers of State and Deputy Ministers, being expenditure charged on the Consolidated Fund, shall be determined by Parliament on the recommendations of the committee referred to in clause (1) of this article.
(3) For the purposes of this article, and except as otherwise provided in this Constitution, “salaries” includes allowances, facilities and privileges and retiring benefits or awards.”
In determining the salaries of the President, his Ministers, and political appointees, as well as the members of the Council of State, the Constitution states that Parliament will determine that based on the advice of the same committee instituted by the President.
This did not include emoluments for spouses of both the president and his vice.
Credit: Professor Yaa Ntiamoah report (shared by Dr Kingsley Antwi-Bosiako)
What was the norm before the introduction of this policy?
Before the introduction of this new policy, presidential spouses were not officially paid salaries.
A private legal practitioner of the Holy Trinity Chambers, Mr Kwame Adofo, explained that both former and incumbent first and second ladies have for some time now received some kind of allowances to cushion them. They were, however, not documented.
“It was never an issue and the public didn’t know about it until this issue was raised. The custom has been that every three months they were given allowances but were not recorded as an article 71 office holder stipend,” he said.
He further explained that the Constitution makes provision for the amendment of article 71 if need be.
“Essentially the constitution itself makes the provision under article 71(e) and says from time to time parliament can pass a law considering certain office holders as article 71 officers,” Adofo said.
“That means, if tomorrow parliament decides that they’ve found or set up another office and they want the emoluments to be one of the article 71 office holders it can simply go ahead and pass a law to make it an article 71 office holder,” he added.
Lawyer Adofo further explained that to make the payment legal, a bill may have to be passed to bring the office of the first and second lady under article 71. Otherwise any payment made to them becomes illegal and violates the 1992 constitution.
Where do the ladies get funding to carry out projects?
First ladies have been involved in, and have set up projects and foundations to support citizens over the years.
In 1989, wife of the President of the 4th republic Jerry Rawlings, Nana Konadu Agyemang Rawlings, instituted the 31st December Women’s Movement. The movement was Ghana’s biggest political organization.
The movement established day-care centres and nurseries, bakeries, fishing cooperatives for women, food-processing factories and a host of economic programmes. It has raised money from both the government and the United Nations’ Development Programme.
Madam Theresa Kufour, wife of the President John Agyekum Kufour in 2007 advocated for policy changes in the Government’s white paper on Educational Reforms towards the implementation of UNESCO’s Free compulsory universal basic education (FCUBE) program for kindergarten children.
The First Lady also founded the Mother and Child Community Development Foundation (MCCDF), a non-governmental organisation operating in Ghana and Canada that supports work in prevention of mother to child transmission.
An educator, Ernestina Naadu Mills was the wife of late president John Atta Mills.
Mills set up a Non-governmental organisation called the Foundation for Child Education Ghana (FCEG) whilst she was First Lady. The Foundation which is a community-based organization set up to promote education in the deprived, rural and poor communities in Ghana.
The organisation’s focus was to help put Ghana’s attainment of the Millennium Development Goal 2, which sought to attain universal education by the end of 2015.
The Lordina Foundation set up by Mrs Lordina Mahama, wife of President Mahama was also dedicated to the welfare of the underprivileged in Ghana, particularly Orphans and Vulnerable Children (OVC) as well as Women.
First and second ladies of Ghana are able to receive funds for projects by partnering international non-governmental organizations, solicit for funds from Ghanaian philanthropists and receive privilege appointments by international bodies to champion charity works and lead advocacy. They usually undertake social programmes and philanthropic activities especially in relation to kids and women.
What’s the practice elsewhere
In the United States of America, the First Lady, also known as the FLOTUS does not get paid for the work carried out as First Lady in support of their husbands, and are often informal champions for charitable causes.
On 10th August 2017, the French Parliament adopted a law for the moralization of politics which bans persons in political office from employing their family members.
Before the passage of the law, past French presidential wives have had small teams working for them at the Elysee, but did not receive a salary.
It is reported that previous arrangements concerning perks for the wives, or partners, of French presidents had lacked transparency, a reason for the passing of the law.
The 1996 Constitution of the Republic of South Africa and the public service regulations do not make provision for a First Lady or First Ladies, and there is no such official designation. However, as has been the practice in past administrations, the Presidency provides administrative support to the spouses of the President through its spousal office.
The spouses may choose to engage in community work or any other activity that supports the work of the President. This is not mandatory as they are not part of the Presidency or the public service. They undertake this work purely on a voluntary basis.
Conclusion
The primary reason the first and second ladies are not paid salaries for their role is because they are not elected and are not office-holders under Article 71.
West Africa’s verification and fact-checking platform, Dubawa, is set to launch a new country office in Sierra Leone.
The launch will take place on July 13, 2021 at the Country Lodge Hotel in Freetown.
A project of the Premium Times Centre for Investigative Journalism (PTCIJ with a core mandate to restore the eroding trust of newsrooms, Dubawa’s mission is to institute a culture of truth and verification in public discourse and journalism through strategic partnerships between the media, government, civil society organizations, technology giants and the public.
“We are super excited at this development, which is one element in the broad mission of Premium Times’ strategy to help deepen the primacy of ethics in governance, in policy making and in journalism within the ECOWAS subregion,” Executive Director of PTCIJ, Dapo Olorunyomi, said.
As part of activities for the official launch, Dubawa will also train journalists and bloggers in fact-checking skills, digitals tools, Right to Information laws and data journalism.
“We are setting up shop in Sierra Leone with the hopes of tackling misinformation and disinformation through rigorous fact-checking, media literacy and research,” Oluwasin Alagbe, Programme Director of PTCIJ also said.
Currently, Dubawa has been holding successful annual fellowships for journalists, fact checkers and researchers in The Gambia, Ghana, Liberia, Nigeria and Sierra Leone to equip fellows with skills in fact-checking and verification in combating the widespread regime of misinformation in the West African sub-region and to also contribute to knowledge around information disorder in the subregion.
First launched in Nigeria as the country’s first indigenous fact-checking platform in 2018, Dubawa expanded its programme to Ghana in 2019 and Sierra Leone in 2020 in a bid to promote accountability and democracy across the West African region. Dubawa currently also has a presence in Liberia and the Gambia.
Claim: In Ghana, tinted car windows are illegal and one can be imprisoned for a year for that, a Whatsapp user claims.
Mostly False. According to the Head of Research Education and Training at the Motor Traffic and Transport Department (MTTD) of the Ghana Police Service, Superintendent Alexander Obeng, tinting of the front windscreen is illegal but tinting windows is permitted only when the transparency is 30%. Offenders face a fine of not less than twenty-five and not more than fifty penalty units, or a term of imprisonment of not fewer than fifty days and not more than three months.
Full Text
A WhatsApp user, claims tinted windows are illegal in Ghana and one can serve up to a year in prison for such an offence.
The claim came up in a group Whatsapp chat as a result of discussions on the rampant road accidents Ghana is facing at the moment.
According to the Whatsapp user,
“You guys erh you should know that if we want to stop road accidents, I think cars with tinted windows must not be allowed on our roads. Even, it is illegal to have tinted windows. One can serve up to one year in prison for having tinted windows.”
Image source: WhatsApp
The claim has been forwarded several times. Dubawa set out to find out the viability of the claim.
Verification
Two claims needed to be fact-checked. The first being that tinted car windows are illegal and that a person can be imprisoned for up to a year if found culpable.
It states that, it is unlawful to have a tinted front windscreen that diminishes the visibility of the one driving and that one can be only allowed to use a tinted screen when there is at least 70% light transmittance to allow the inhabitants to see and be seen.
“A person shall not drive a motor vehicle with a tinted front windscreen… A person may drive a motor vehicle which has glass other than the windscreen and front glass tinted with light transmittance of at least seventy percent to allow the occupants to see and be seen, if;
The film or tinting material applied to the windscreen or window has a textured surface or is a fixture or an attachment but does not reduce the visibility of the person driving the motor.
The film or material applied to the windscreen or window has a textured surface or is a fixture or an attachment but does not reduce the visibility of the person driving the motor vehicle in any direction.”
To seek more clarity on this, Dubawa spoke to the Head of Research Education and Training at the Motor Traffic and Transport Department (MTTD) of the Ghana Police Service, Superintendent Alexander Obeng.
According to him, tinting the front windscreen is illegal, nonetheless tinting the side windscreen is permissible but its transparency should be 30%. This, according to him, is to enable them to see drivers from a distance away.
“Nobody is saying you shouldn’t tint; you can tint the side windows but it must be 30% transparent. This is according to the discretion of the police. Because we should be able to see you as to whether you are adhering to the driving regulations which include you not being on phone and wearing your seatbelt while driving. With the front windscreen, we have noticed some are tinting. We are advising them to remove it because tinting the front window is illegal. The only thing that should be on the front glass is the roadworthy sticker and insurance sticker”.
Deputy Public Relations Officer of the Accra Regional Police Command, Inspector Bright Kwabena Danso, also indicated that driving a vehicle with tinted glasses is illegal even though it has been seen as a symbol of status and lifestyle, while others see it as a security measure or for privacy.
“Vehicle owners must know that there are strict laws around its application. To some people, tinted windscreens do have aesthetic value, and can serve as some level of safety, but they must remember the implications and the law,” he told Daily Graphic in a 2019 interview.
Also, Dubawa found out stories from ghanaweb.com and peacefmonline.com affirming that the tinted car windscreens are illegal.
What is the penalty when you go against the law?
The Head of Research Education and Training at the Motor Traffic and Transport Department (MTTD) of the Ghana Police Service, Superintendent Alexander Obeng dismissed claims that a person could serve a year in prison for the offence.
According to Obeng,
“…the law is already there. Our job is to enforce it. So, the law says when you are found culpable you can be convicted to a fine in penalty units where one penalty unit is GH₵12.00. So assuming you are convicted with 2,000 penalty units you just have to multiply GH₵12.00 by the penalty units assigned to you. Also, you can serve a term of imprisonment of not less than 30days. So, reject claims that it is one year”.
Subregulation 6 of regulation 67 of the Road Traffic Regulations Act 2012 also states that “ a person who contravenes this regulation commits an offense is liable on summary conviction to a fine of not less than twenty-five and not more than fifty penalty units or a term of imprisonment of not less than fifty days and not more than three months or both”.
Conclusion
From the evidence above it is clear that the claim that tinted car windows are illegal and that one can be imprisoned for up to a year if found culpable is misleading.
This report was produced under the Dubawa Student Fact-checking Project aimed at offering students in tertiary schools aspiring to take up roles in the profession the opportunity to acquire real-world experience through verification and fact-checking.
As the world continues to become even more digital, social media has become one of the numerous ways people connect with one another. People connect with families, share photos, videos and messages using social media.
According to the latest social media report by Hootsuite, there are about 4.2 billion social media users. These users, although some may represent businesses, organizations or other non-human entities, represent real people who connect with other users daily.
However, as the advancement of technology and social media use increase, so do various internet or social media related crimes and unethical habits also take new forms. The most prominent social media crimes include identity theft and “phishing”. Phishing is a cybercrime in which a target or targets are contacted by email, telephone or text message by someone posing as a legitimate institution to lure individuals into providing sensitive data such as personally identifiable information, banking and credit card details, and passwords. These crimes may happen when attackers get access to your social media accounts. In this report, Dubawa Ghana has compiled five ways to help secure your social media accounts.
1. Enable Two-Factor Authentication on all accounts (2FA)
One effective way to protect any social media account is to enable two-factor authentication in your account. Two-factor authentication allows web services secondary access to the account owner in order to verify a login attempt. In most cases, this involves a phone number and / or an email address. When a new device or an Internet Protocol (I.P) address tries to log in to any social media account, you use your mobile phone to verify your identity by either clicking on a text or emailed link or typing in a number sent by an authenticator app. This prompts an account owner of any log in from anywhere around the world.
Aside from linking your phone number to your two-factor authentication, a very effective way is to use an authenticator app. This is helpful in times of no cellular access. Some authenticator apps include Duo, Google authenticator and Authy.
To turn your two-factor authentication on, check the “security” section of your “settings” on any social media service you have signed on to.
2. Choose a strong password
Probably the first step to making sure your account is secure, choosing a strong password is very important. Always endeavour to use passwords that are hard to guess, even by your very close friends and family. Do not use popular jargons that you share with other people. Try to mix alphabets, numbers and symbols in your password and try as much as possible to change it often. You should choose a password that you can remember.
Do not write passwords in diaries or places that are accessible to other people. On some social media platforms like Facebook, you are allowed to use your account to sign in to other social media apps like Instagram with the same user details. It is advisable not to do that. Use Facebook logins for only Facebook. This will prevent hackers who have access to your Facebook from logging into your other social media accounts such as Facebook with the same details,
3. Know how many devices are logged into your account
Try as much as possible to always know how many devices are logged in to your social media accounts and where the devices are located. Once you notice any unrecognized device from a location you are not sure of, log that device out. On Facebook and other social media apps, you can find this at the “security and login” section in your settings. The screenshot below is an example of how this setting looks on Facebook.
4. Avoid access to third party applications or websites
Once a while, take inventory of your social media accounts to see if there are any third-party applications that you have granted access to your personal social media account. For instance, there are websites that require you to log in with a social media account. Make sure you are okay with what information they are accessing from your social profile/account as these can be gateways to your account for hackers. If there are any you do not use anymore, delete them. On Facebook, for instance, you can check this at the “apps and websites” section in your settings. Remove any app or website you are not sure off. This applies to other social media platforms such as Twitter and Instagram.
5. Create unique emails for your social media accounts
If possible, create a dedicated email specifically for your social media accounts. With this, if your social media accounts are compromised, the hackers won’t have access to any valuable information from your important personal emails.
These tips, although not exhaustive, will help you take control of your social media accounts and prevent you from being a victim of cyber crime.
