FAKE NEWS ALERT: AIT denies reporting ‘Uber driver fled coronavirus isolation’

AIT has denied a report attributed to it that one Adewale Isaac Olorogun, said to be an Uber driver, picked up the Italian who tested positive to coronavirus in Lagos.

According to a message widely circulated on social media, the purported Uber driver, who has reportedly contracted the virus, refused to be quarantined and threatened to spread the disease if the Ogun state government did not meet his demand of N100 million.

Below is the message attributed to AIT’s Facebook account:

MAN WHO DROVE WHITE MAN TO COMPANY IN OGUN STATE DIAGNOSED WITH CORONA VIRUS, RUNS AWAY FROM HOSPITAL AND THREATENS TO SPREAD THE VIRUS ALL OVER NIGERIA BY TAKING PUBLIC TRANSPORT TO DIFFERENT STATES, IF HIS FAMILY IS NOT PAID 100MILLION NAIRA
The man whose picture appear below is Adewale Isaac Olorogun, he is said to be the taxi driver that conveyed the white man to the company in Ogun State that has been quarantined. After much plea by the Ogun State government, he finally got to the hospital and was tested positive for the virus, before they could say Jack Robinson, the man had disappeared, sending a message for the 100MILLION to the commissioner for health saying, nor be only una go chop the money, na my family turn, either una pay or una die, i go waka sotay plenty people follow me remove from this wayward country.

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But in a swift reaction, Nigeria’s first independent television station has debunked the report.

One of the pictures attached to the fake news is supposedly that of Olorogun but checks by TheCable showed that the picture is that of Jude Ikuenobe, who was reported to have left Nigeria in 2018 hoping to make a journey to Europe, but got stranded in a slave camp in Libya. 

The tweet below is that of a story done by BuzzFeed News, an American online media company, on the plight of Ikuenobe.

In 2018, slavery is very much alive, with a cruel twist — people from sub-Saharan Africa are often selling themselves into slavery. Here’s the story of how one man ended up trapped. A thread: https://t.co/Xmh0Saef7o

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— BuzzFeed News (@BuzzFeedNews) December 15, 2018

There is nothing yet that shows that the Italian patient met “Olorogun”. TheCable reached out to Uber to confirm if “Olorogun” is one of its drivers but there was no response from the cab hailing service as of the time of filing this report.

While the federal government had announced that efforts were in place to track those who had contact with the Italian patient, the Ogun state government said 28 persons have been placed under quarantine.

No reference was made to the driver who picked the Italian from Murtala Muhammed International Airport, Lagos, to the hotel where he passed the night in Lagos or Lafarge Africa PLC, Ewekoro, Ogun, where he moved to the next day.

Since Nigeria confirmed its first case of coronavirus on Friday, there have been different false reports making the rounds.

TheCable had reported how some persons circulated messages that the Italian patient went to an oil firm in Victoria Island, Lagos.