Video of two burning cars in Nigeria's Anambra state is from 2021, not 2024 police escort attack as claimed on social media
IN SHORT: A video showing two cars burning in the middle of the road is circulating on social media in Nigeria. Users claim it shows an attack on a police escort in September 2024. But the video is from 2021 and shows an attack on a billionaire's convoy.
"So DPO jumped fence again today but this time the fence was too high for him to climb successfully," reads the caption of a video circulating on social media in Nigeria since early September 2024.
The "DPO" in the claim most likely refers to a divisional police officer, an officer who heads a police division.
The video shows two cars burning in the middle of the road.
The man speaking in the video says the incident occurred in the Nigerian state of Anambra.
He also claims that "the police escort, all the people occupying the vehicles" were shot dead. "Look at this policeman inside ... it's a terrible situation," the man adds.
The video has also been posted here and here. (Note: See more instances listed at the end of the report.)
But does it show an attack on a police escort in Anambra state in 2024, as the posts suggest? We checked.
Ignore old video
Africa Check took keyframes from the video and ran them through a Google reverse image search.
This led us to a July 2021 article in the Nigerian newspaper Punch. The article was headlined: "How gunmen killed billionaire club owner Philip Udala, set his convoy ablaze in Anambra."
The newspaper said: "The gunmen reportedly attacked a police facility in the area, and were fleeing the scene when they ran into Udala's convoy. The convoy was set ablaze, killing all occupants in both cars."
We also found the same video posted on X (formerly Twitter) in July 2021, with the caption: "Gunmen m*rder Philanthropist Billionaire - Philip Udala, his manager and policemen. Set them ablaze with their vehicles."
We found no media or police reports of such an attack in Anambra state in 2024.
