A photo of a man’s back, crisscrossed with bloody wounds, is being shared widely online in Nigeria to be of a corps member beaten in Zamfara.

The claim is FALSE!

One of the posts seen with the picture claims that it is the back of a Nigerian National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) member named Michael after he was beaten and flogged.

The text says: “Michael – serving in Nasara Standard Academy, perceived as the shining light in a tottering secondary education system in KauraNamoda – was today brutalised, manhandled and reduced to nothingness by a brainless team comprising of the ‘richest’ man in KauraNamoda and his equally wanton boys. What was his crime?”

It adds that, “Michael” punished a student who was the “ward” of the “richest man in KauraNamoda” and was then beaten up by the man and police officers supporting him.

The picture was traced to an article in February 2019, about the security forces of the former president of Sudan, Omar Al Bashir, under the caption: “Sudanese Protester tortured by Bashir Security forces”.

While the photo is not of an NYSC member and not of real torture, a corps member called Michael Uwakwe was “assaulted by police in Zamfara”, according to newspaper reports from March 2017 and statements by police. 

Mohammed Shehu, public relations officer for the Zamfara Police Command, confirmed that Michael Uwakwe was assaulted in 2017 but the photo used in the claim is a wrong photo.

“The photo used in the claim is not that of the corps member who was punished in 2017. Also, the corps member was not tortured and brutalized,” said the police PRO.

Shehu also released a statement “completely debunking the story and urging members of the public to discountenance it in its entirety”.

The NYSC has also stated that no corps member was assaulted in the area recently.

CONCLUSION

The claim that a corps member was beaten in Zamfara as shown in the picture is FALSE