Degrading images of the South Sudanese leader taken during an official ceremony have leaked onto social media. And were accompanied by rumors about the fate of the reporters who broadcast them.
The video footage immediately went viral. We see an African head of state urinating on it in the middle of an official ceremony. A scene that took place on Tuesday December 13 when Salva Kiir Mayardit, President of South Sudan, attended the inauguration of a highway. In the images broadcast live on television, Mayardit, 71, stands surrounded by his staff to hear the national anthem. A few seconds later his pants are clearly soaked.
The facts, because they are concerned about the health of the President of this East African state, have been reported by many websites dealing with African news, including French-language ones (like Afrik Soir or Koaci). The information was leaked to the western media and was notably relayed by the British newspaper The Chron. For its part, the African News Agency published a story on the matter, stating that “the President, who has ruled the country since independence on July 9, 2011, can be seen peeing on himself”.
The images were then posted on social media, where videos lasting a few tens of seconds accumulate hundreds of thousands of views. Some netizens have responded by mocking the head of state, while others have protested the attitude of the journalists who filmed the event, believing they should have cut that passage from the air. Assumptions about the fate of these reporters quickly flooded the Internet. According to the versions, they were wanted by the authorities, had disappeared or even been found dead.
Misleading Content
A first rumor arose from a publication posted to Facebook on Thursday afternoon, December 15, before being deleted in the hours that followed. Despite its removal, this content spread widely in the form of screenshots. The text reads: “Righteousness is served from heaven. The unethical journalist who shared the President’s video took his own life at his home this afternoon. Also according to that Facebook post, the journalist in question would have left a note “blaming himself” for showing the video to a friend, “blaming his friend” for sending it, and “ask for forgiveness.” asks”. Attached to the publication is a photo showing a hanged man.
The alleged information was picked up by several news sites, including online media Blueprint Africa. It has even led to a second suspicion that this was an execution disguised as a suicide. “It means that South Sudan has liquidated the journalist it suspected of being the source of the video clip of Salva Kiir pissing himself. This is their modus operandi for passing off an official murder as a suicide,” notes a Twitter user.
In any case, while it cannot be ruled out that some journalists felt guilty or faced reprisals, this specific content is misleading. With good reason, the man we see in the photo is neither South Sudanese nor a journalist. A reverse image search also identifies him as a Nigerian businessman who committed suicide in August, likely over large sums owed as part of settling a dispute.
“Disappear One by One”
Second act of rumour-mongering: a series of tweets from the Twitter account of Julius Bukyana, former presenter and journalist of the Ugandan TV channel NBS TV. “The journalist who shared video of President Salva Kir wetting his trousers during a national event allegedly committed suicide, his body was found hanged in his home,” he tweeted in the morning from 16.12before substantiating his point of view by publication the day after a shot of the Facebook post that started it all. Meanwhile, Julius Bukyana, also a former candidate for the East African Legislative Assembly (EALA), made this particular case public. by writing this “One by one, all the journalists covering the public event where South Sudanese President Salva Kir wet his pants disappeared and some were found dead.”
This extrapolation was also disseminated as such in press articles. The African News Agency reported in a story on Saturday that netizens “revealed that some journalists covering the state event in South Sudan where President Salva Kiir Mayardit peed on himself while reciting the national anthem disappeared one by one”.
A claim contradicted by the Union of Journalists of South Sudan (UJOSS) in a press release also published on social media on Saturday. “According to our information, no journalist has been arrested and no journalist is missing,” assures Oyet Patrick Charles, President of UJOSS. When asked by CheckNews on Tuesday, he replied that “the situation remains unchanged, no one is missing and no one is dead.” And adds: “If a journalist is arrested, we make the biggest noise.”
“Everything leads to faith [que les rumeurs] are unfounded and that this information is false,” a spokeswoman for the NGO Reporters Without Borders told CheckNews.
“editorial writing”
These rumors are false, or at least impossible to confirm at this time, but are a cause for concern in the South Sudanese media. A journalist from SSBC (South Sudan Broadcasting Corporation) told Sudans Post newspaper that South Sudan’s security forces are conducting searches to identify the reporter behind the pictures and that security agents from the President’s Office have asked them to help them find him identify. The same source also reports “having heard that three of the Juba-based journalists [la capitale du pays, ndlr] disappeared”. Sudans Post adds: “Another journalist said he could not rule out that one of his colleagues had been arrested but said he was investigating whether an arrest had taken place since the video of the President was published and described the situation for journalists in South Sudan as “unpredictable and dangerous”.
Reporters Without Borders agrees. On a page dedicated to Salva Kiir Mayardit, she described the South Sudanese President to the media as a “predator”. “For journalists, South Sudan is one of the most hostile and dangerous African countries on the continent,” RSF emphasizes, specifying: “Journalists working in the country are subject to censorship and pressure. The security apparatus is often used to prevent them from working and plays the role of an editorial police force that does not hesitate to infiltrate editorial offices, confiscate newspaper editions from the printers, or carry out arbitrary arrests and secret detentions. In addition, since South Sudan’s founding in 2011, “a dozen reporters have been killed or murdered with the utmost impunity.” “This predatory policy is nurtured and endorsed directly by the President, who did not hesitate to threaten the deaths of journalists whom he considers hostile to his interests,” the NGO laments.