These photos show an Indonesian who died in 2017, not his 150th birthday party

This article is more than one year old.
Published on March 26, 2021 at 13:37
2 min read
By Mary KULUNDU, AFP Kenya

A Facebook post purporting to show photos of a man celebrating his 150th birthday has been shared nearly 100 times in Uganda. The claim is false: the person seen in the images is an Indonesian man who died in 2017. At the time of his death, he was 146 years old based on his ID card, according to media reports, but this could not be verified independently.

A Facebook post published on March 22, 2021, features three images of an old man alongside the caption: “Papa Mike is Now 150 Years on Earth, If You Want Long Life, Wish Legend Old Papa Happy birthday (Sic).”

The same post was shared here on Facebook.

The post includes three images of an elderly man and one of a cake with candles forming the number 146.

A screenshot of the false Facebook post, taken on March 25, 2021

In 2019, the same images circulated online alongside claims that the photos showed the world’s oldest man, who was celebrating his 146th birthday. A different Facebook post published in 2020 also alleged that the same man was celebrating his 146th birthday that year.

A screenshot of false Facebook posts, left: 2019 and right:2020, taken on March 26, 2021

But these claims are false. The photos show Mbah Goto, an Indonesian national also known as Sodimedjo or Grandpa Goto, who died in 2017.

Not world's oldest man

A reverse image search reveals 2017 news reports (here and here) on Goto’s death. The photo agency Getty Images also covered his funeral on May 1, 2017.

His papers indicated that Goto was born on December 31, 1870, meaning he would have been 146 years at the time of his death (see on Getty Images here). However, this has not been verified independently.

Images of his last birthday party can be seen here, here and here.

AFP Fact Check previously debunked a claim that Goto had been the world's oldest person. A spokeswoman for Guinness World Records confirmed that he never held this official title.

“From what I can see from our records we have never verified Mbah Goto for one of these titles and it is likely down to the lack of ability to verify his age,” Jessica Spillane told AFP on December 6, 2019.

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