No, this is not a video of Michael Jackson singing 'Give thanks to Allah'

This article is more than one year old.
Published on December 19, 2018 at 10:30
1 min read
By AFP Pakistan

Videos purporting to show late singer Michael Jackson singing “Give thanks to Allah”, in front of an audience including former US President Bill Clinton have been viewed nearly ten million times on Facebook and YouTube. The claim is false, it is the voice of South African singer Zain Bhikha singing dubbed over the top of a video of Jackson performing at Clinton's 1993 inauguration.

The video shared in this Facebook post has been viewed 3.9 million times since it was posted in February.

It has a caption that says: "America's famous pop singer Michael Jackson, in a beautiful voice sang the names of Allah in front of then President Bill Clinton and thousands of people. Watch it yourself and share it too. Thanks."

Other versions of the video have also been widely shared, for example here on Facebook where it has received more than 2.2 million views, and here on YouTube where it has been viewed 3.7 million times.

All of the videos are from January 19, 1993 when Jackson sang at Bill Clinton’s inauguration gala, where he performed “Gone too soon” and “Heal the world”.

The track “Give thanks to Allah” has been dubbed over a video of this performance.

The version of “Give thanks to Allah” dubbed onto the Jackson videos is by South African singer Zain Bhikha.

Here is the original song by Bhikha on Apple Music and Amazon.

Is there content that you would like AFP to fact-check? Get in touch.

E-mail