Video shows actors filming a skit, not a couple linked to leaked sex tapes scandal in Equatorial Guinea

Equatorial Guinea, a small country in central Africa, made global headlines in early November when a series of videos featuring a top government official having sex with numerous women went viral online. A clip shared days after the scandal broke purportedly shows a man accusing his wife of being one of the women in the leaked tapes. However, this is false: the viral footage of the so-called couple was filmed as a joke by a known content creator from Cameroon who had nothing to do with the scandal.

“Allegedly, she was one of the ladies in that trending Equatorial Guinea man sex scandal. She was spotted calling her husband baby before he showed her the sex videos she had with Baltasar Engonga, she couldn’t believe it,” reads an X post published on November 5, 2024.

Reshared more than 3,000 times, the post purports to show a video of a husband confronting his wife for featuring in some of the sex clips linked to Engonga.

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Screenshot of the false post taken on November 21, 2024

The post also includes a photograph of Engonga, the former director of the National Financial Investigation Agency (ANIF) in Equatorial Guinea.

Engonga gained immediate infamy when a series of videos showing him having sex with different women – some of them the wives of prominent officials – leaked on the internet on November 1 (archived here).

The videos spread on social networks while Engonga was in custody at Malabo’s Black Beach prison for allegedly embezzling public funds.

The clip of the arguing couple was originally shared on TikTok on November 5, 2024.

It also appeared here and here on Facebook with the same claim.

However, the footage is unrelated to Engonga’s antics.

Video from actors

Using the InVID-WeVerify tool, we extracted keyframes from the TikTok clip and conducted a reverse image search.

The results led to a video posted on Facebook on November 4, 2024 (archived here) by Cameroonian comedian and actress, Kaprice Akamba.

“Baltasar and the remorse,” reads the caption translated from French, a common saying in Cameroon when one partner accuses another of bewitchment using witchcraft.

Akamba also posted the video on her other social media accounts (archived here). A day later, it went viral and became associated by many with Engonga’s controversy.

AFP Fact Check matched screenshots from the clip in the false post to the video shared by Akamba, who is known in Cameroon for being an influencer and comedian (archived here).

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Comparison screenshot of the false X post (left) and original Facebook post (right)

Akamba’s original Facebook post also contained four hashtags including #Cameroon and #Douala.

Douala is the largest city in Cameroon – about 243 kilometres away from Equatorial Guinea (archived here).

On November 6, the X account that posted Akamba’s video with the false claim shared an update acknowledging that the context was false (archived here).

The original X post, however, remains online as of November 27, 2024.