No evidence that international journalism institute critical of CNN report on Nigerian protests exists

“Lekki shooting: CNN carried out a hatchet job on the Army - International journalists,” reads a headline in news reports shared on social media in Nigeria here, here and here.

What followed was a lengthy criticism purportedly issued in the form of a press statement by the International Institute for Investigative Journalism, signed by its “special rapporteur Francois Deburoiche”, denouncing a special CNN report that, it said, “was very hasty in its conclusion by indicting the Nigerian Army of culpability in the events at the Lekki Tollgate”.

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A screenshot taken on December 9, 2020, showing the false post

Nigeria was engulfed by widespread protests in October as people took to the streets to vent their anger at law enforcement agencies, accused for years of abuse and extra-judicial killings.

On October 20, 2020, members of the Nigerian army shot at unarmed protesters who were gathered at Lekki tollgate in Lagos. The army denied responsibility for the deadly incident, tagging it on social media as fake news. 

Fake News!!! pic.twitter.com/4c1LHhRD7s

— Nigerian Army (@HQNigerianArmy) October 20, 2020

CNN investigated the events and concluded that the Nigerian army indeed opened fire on peaceful protesters, killing at least one person. The report -- broadcast on November 18, 2020 and snubbed by officials -- also claimed that soldiers removed bodies from the scene. 

“Sadly the purveyors of fake news and disinformation succeeded in deceiving the entire world that indeed there was mass killing in Lekki,” was the response on November 19, 2020 from Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed. “Not a single body has been produced… the world may have just witnessed for the very first time ever a massacre without bodies.” 

The army eventually relented somewhat, going from outright denial of any involvement to admitting its personnel were present at the shooting and had live rounds. 

Non-existent journalism institute faults CNN

Six days following CNN’s broadcast, social media began spreading a purported statement by an entity calling itself the International Institute for Investigative Journalism which claimed that “the CNN documentary on the EndSARS protest in Nigeria was released to the general public with lots of inaccuracies. These accuracies were detected after an extensive forensic investigation by the International Institute for Investigative Journalism.”

AFP Fact Check searched online for details of the purported institute and found nothing but third-party references by news sites to the so-called press statement. Of the 139 results across 14 pages found by Google’s search engine December 8, 2020, not one pointed in the direction of an actual journalism institute by that name or any evidence of existing digital properties like a website and social media accounts. 

However, the Google search yielded links to other journalism institutes, among them: theInternational Consortium for Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), the International Centre for Investigative Reporting (ICIR), the International Centre for Journalists (ICFJ), the Institute for Investigative Journalism at Concordia University and other recognised investigative journalism bodies. The statement could not be found on their websites.

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A screenshot taken on December 9, 2020, showing the last page of the Google search

Adding to the intrigue was the name behind the purported statement -- one Francois Deburoiche, identified as the organisation’s “special rapporteur”. Again, we searched for Deburoiche and, other than the name being linked to the purported press statement, there was no digital footprint of anyone with the same name. 

Sun Newspaper, New Telegraph delete post

Using advanced Google search engine and Crowdtangle, AFP Fact Check also searched for the earliest publication of the “press statement” and we traced it to an online post by the New Telegraph newspaper on November 24, 2020. The Sun newspaper in Nigeria also published a version before noon on November 25, 2020. Both media groups (Sun, New Telegraph) have since deleted their posts, but other newspapers who also published a report -- Blueprint, Signal -- still had the posts online as of December 10, 2020.

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A screenshot taken on December 9, 2020, showing the now deleted New Telegraph report

None of the major credible online and traditional newspapers in Nigeria gave any coverage to the purported statement. An advanced Google search also showed that the non-existent institute had not published anything online before and after its so-called press statement.

Meanwhile, the International Centre for Investigative Reporting (ICIR) checked into the origins of the statement and found that “Francois Deburoiche is a pseudonym and the only reference to that name on the internet is in the press statement issued”.

At the height of the protests, various false claims and posts carrying misinformation were debunked by AFP Fact Check, among them these here and here.