IN SHORT: A video showing the shooting of hundreds of people by terrorists has circulated on social media with the claim it shows bandits killing people kidnapped in Sokoto in northwestern Nigeria. But this is false - the video shows a jihadist terrorist attack filmed in Burkina Faso.
Warning: This fact-check links to a disturbing video showing a violent attack.
A chilling video showing hundreds of people in a trench being shot at close range has circulated on WhatsApp and Facebook in Nigeria, with the claim it shows bandits killing 150 people abducted in Sokoto in north-west Nigeria.
"Bandits kill those 150 community people kidnapped in SOKOTO STATE, as the govt refused to pay 200 Billion ransom with 250 Bikes," one caption to the video posted on Facebook reads.
Multiple posts on Facebook have shared the video with the same claim, including here, here and here.
The claim also appears in other posts here, here and here. (Note: See more instances at the end of the report.)
But is this claim an accurate description of the viral video?
Violent crime by bandits escalating
Organised criminals, known locally as bandits, have plagued northwestern and central Nigeria for years. A 2021 BBC report describes the problem: "Gangs on motorbikes terrorise the region, stealing animals, kidnapping for ransom, killing anyone who dares confront them and taxing farmers - it's a huge money-making operation."
There was an escalation of violent attacks and kidnapping by bandits in Sokoto state in August 2024.
There are media reports of bandits kidnapping about 150 people and rustling over 1,000 cattle in some villages in the Gobir emirate of Sokoto state, days after killing the local emir.
An emir is an Islamic military commander, governor of a province, or a high military official.
President Bola Tinubu has directed the defence minister and military chief to relocate to Sokoto to "flush out the bandits". There have been no credible media reports that any of the kidnapped people have been killed.
Video shows terror attack in Burkina Faso
Africa Check did a reverse image search of screenshots from the video, which led to a number of results, including a report in a Sudanese newspaper written in Arabic.
We used Google Translate to translate the report into English. It stated that the video had been falsely attributed to events in Sudan but the newspaper's investigations showed the event occurred in Burkina Faso.
"Bloggers attributed the events to the Rapid Support militia in the Al Daein area, but the Juhayna Team website conducted an investigation into the origin of the video and confirmed that the events occurred in Burkina Faso earlier and have nothing to do with Sudan," the machine-translated report reads.
We then searched further, using keywords related to killings in Burkina Faso. This led us to a Reuters report of hundreds killed in north-central Burkina Faso on 27 August after "suspected jihadists opened fire on them as they were digging trenches around a town to protect it from attacks."
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We also found a YouTube video report by Reuters about the killing in Burkina Faso, which includes the video in question.
The United Nations has condemned the terror attack in Burkina Faso, which has been attributed to an Al Qaeda-linked militant group known as Jama'at Nusrat al-Islam wal Muslimin, or JNIM.
The claim that the video shows bandits killing 150 kidnap victims in Sokoto, north-western Nigeria is false.
The same claim was also posted here, here, here, here, here, here, and here.
