Claim: Gov’t will spend half of the 2023 budget on Mayoral election
Source: Voice Newspaper, the Gambia
Verdict: Misleading headline
On the 16th November, 2002 The Voice Newspaper made a publication with the headline that one Sheikhan Faal has claimed that the government of The Gambia will be spending half of the 2023 budget on the Mayoral elections Gov’t will spend half of 2023 budget on Mayoral elections – Sheikhna Faal – (voicegambia.com). The claim has elevated public notice about how the government could spend half of an annual budget on elections thus entertaining ample questions and qualms. The fact-check center has launched a fact check on the claim to verity its authenticity.
First, the budget line allocated for the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) in the 2023 Estimate Budget is 240 million dalasis out of 22billion dalasis which represents 1.09% of the total estimate.
Moving forward, the headline published does not match with the content of the report as stated Gov’t will spend half of 2023 budget on Mayoral elections – Sheikhna Faal – (voicegambia.com). In ensuring an adequate clarification and fact-checking, our researchers further reached out to the party involved (interviewee, Mr. Sheikhan Faal) in the claim, Mr. Faal made it clear that the headline published did not reflect the interview he did with the voice newspaper. According to Mr. Faal, what he said was that the estimate budget for some of the sectors will not be used for their purposes and funds might be diverted for personal gain most especially in the upcoming Mayoral Elections. “The headline is misleading and that is not what I said or meant in the interview,” he added.
He further told our researchers that he was surprised that the headline said otherwise. Furthermore, the reporter for this particular publication has confirm that the headline deferred with the content and that she accepted that the headline is indeed not what Mr. Faal said in the interview. She also urged people to read the entire story to get the exact details that the publication intended to communicate. Here is what she said in a voice note: “by the way, they should read the entire story because divert is there, but it’s okay, only people that don’t think twice otherwise before contradicting people’s statement but this is Gambia, people can be controversial sometimes”.
Conclusion
Our findings have it that the headline for this particular story is misleading and did not reflect the content and the interview. What Mr. Faal meant in the interview is that, public funds are always diverted for purposes they are not meant for and he believes the same thing will happen as the Mayoral elections is fast approaching. Therefore, the headline published by the Voice Newspaper is misleading.
