Claim:
A video shared on X (formerly Twitter) claims that the President of the Commission Électorale Nationale Indépendante (CENI) – Independent National Electoral Commission – of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), Denis Kazadi Kadima, was lynched after compromising the 2023 presidential election in the country.
Verdict:
The claim is false. While the video shows a woman being mobbed, a Google search indicated that the head of CENI is a man and not a woman. Social media posts also show that the woman is a supporter of an opposition candidate.
Full text:
An X user, @SabinaNkiru, posted a video claiming that CENI’s president was “humiliated after announcing fake and rigged results.” The account went on to read: “If INEC and Co was afraid of something even a little bit like this, our fortunes today will be much better.”
The 1:23 video has a woman being beaten by a mob while security personnel are trying to save her. Efforts for her to escape using a motorcycle with the help of the operatives is futile as the assault is intense, leading the actors to shelf the plan.
The video which had garnered 732,000 views saw other users calling for the replication of such in Nigeria to end the mistrust Nigerian electorate have with INEC.
Brief on DRC’s 2023 elections
The DRC held its general elections on December 20, 2023, with 26 candidates vying for the presidency.
According to a report by the BBC, the country was electing a president, along with national, provincial and local representatives, with 41 million voters choosing among 100,000 candidates “from at least 70 political parties and coalitions.”
It added that the elections were the fourth national elections since the return of multiparty democracy in 2006.
The major contestants are President Félix Tshisekedi; Moïse Katumbi, a business tycoon and former governor; Martin Fayulu, a former Exxon Mobil executive; and Denis Mukwege, a gynaecologist and 2018 Nobel Peace Prize winner.
CENI later announced that Tshisekedi won the presidential poll with 73.34 per cent of the total votes and Katumbi attained second position with about 18 per cent of the votes.
But in a statement by five other presidential candidates, they claimed that the elections marred by “irregularities sufficiently attest that the elections on December 20, 2023, was a sham organised in violation of the fundamental rights of the Congolese people.”
Verification:
A key frame analysis from the video showed that the event occurred in the DRC as the video emerged a day after the December 20, 2023 general elections.
An X account had posted the video the same day it was posted by @SabinaNkiru, with the same narrative that it was the electoral chairlady of the DRC that was lynched.
However, a screenshot of the video was posted on December 22, by @albcontact, lamenting how society is becoming vile with mob attacks, especially, women in the country under President Tshisekedi.
The earliest upload of the video was on December 21, by an account, @3Ledia3, which posted it with a comment in French saying the event happened in a province called Kasai in DRC and that the woman was a supporter of an opposition candidate.
A Google translation showed the post read: “The result of the hate speech of #Tshisekedi is there in #Kasaï! The only sin of this lynched woman is to talk about @moise_katumbi. This jungle practice must stop, we must not consider ourselves enemies….”
This position was corroborated by another account, @CopyThatKE, that the claim on the chairperson of the electoral commission in the video was false.
The account responded to another post thus: “This is misinformation. I have been following the DRC elections keenly. This was on the voting day. The lady was beaten at a place called Kasai for allegedly voting for Katumbi when that area is a known as a Tshisekedi stronghold. She is not an election official.”
Also, a check on Google search engine showed that the head of DRC’s electoral commission is Denis Kadima.
Kadima, who is a man, goes by the title “President of CENI”.
Conclusion:
The claim that the President of CENI was mobbed by the electorate is false. The video which was used to propel the narrative, according to social posts, is that of supporters of President a Tshisekedi attacking a supporter of one of the opposition candidates.
