This Facebook post with a video supposedly of Nigerian troops in Niger is FALSE.

The post reads: “Nigerian army comprises of ecowas are correctly in Niger Republic to combat the African revolutionist army (sic).”

The description of the video, which was originally shared on TikTok, is: “Nigerian army at Niger.” The footage has an image of Niger’s deposed President Mohamed Bazoum and the country’s flag at the bottom.

The recording is of soldiers during what appears to be troops in combat. Towards the end of the 1-minute, 7-second video, an individual is running and proclaiming repeatedly: “We want peace.”

The video has also been shared here.

The TikTok video was published on 27 July 2023, a day after General Abdourahmane Tchiani, Niger’s head of the presidential guard, led a coup against Bazoum.

The claim we are fact-checking was shared on 5 August 2023 and claims that Nigeria had sent its troops to Niger to combat the ‘African revolutionist army.’

Nigeria is a member of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), which announced the possibility of military intervention against the coup leaders if they do not return Bazoum — the elected leader — to power.

The regional bloc gave the coup leaders a 6 August 2023 deadline to reinstate Bazoum. However, on deadline day, the military dismissed the ultimatum and closed the country’s airspace.

Given that there is no update on the planned military action, we investigated the video’s origins.

The TikTok video’s comments suggest that it is old and was taken either in Sierra Leone or Liberia.

A consequent keyword search on Liberia does not yield any similar video. However, a keyword search on the Nigerian army in Sierra Leone brings up the same video uploaded by MiliTainment TV on 16 June 2020 and titled, “We Know They Can Do It Again And Again: See How Nigerian Soldiers Captured Freetown in Sierra Leone.”

A follow-up search on YouTube using keywords from the Militainment TV’s title brings up the same video, uploaded by American news agency Associated Press (AP) on 21 July 2015.

The video’s title reads: “SIERRA LEONE: REBELS LOYAL TO OLD REGIME STILL FIGHTING ECOMOG.” The video’s description states it shows a Nigerian-led intervention in Sierra Leone in February 1998.

It is also clear that the AP logo was cropped on the top right corner of the video under scrutiny.

PesaCheck has looked into a Facebook post with a video supposedly of Nigerian troops in the Republic of Niger and found it to be FALSE.

This post is part of an ongoing series of PesaCheck fact-checks examining content marked as potential misinformation on Facebook and other social media platforms.

By partnering with Facebook and similar social media platforms, third-party fact-checking organisations like PesaCheck are helping to sort fact from fiction. We do this by giving the public deeper insight and context to posts they see in their social media feeds.

Have you spotted what you think is fake or false information on Facebook? Here’s how you can report. And, here’s more information on PesaCheck’s methodology for fact-checking questionable content.

This fact-check was written by PesaCheck Fact-Checker Harriet Ogayo and edited by PesaCheck senior copy editor Cédrick Irakoze and acting chief copy editor Francis Mwaniki.

The article was approved for publication by PesaCheck managing editor Doreen Wainainah.

PesaCheck is East Africa’s first public finance fact-checking initiative. It was co-founded by Catherine Gicheru and Justin Arenstein, and is being incubated by the continent’s largest civic technology and data journalism accelerator: Code for Africa. It seeks to help the public separate fact from fiction in public pronouncements about the numbers that shape our world, with a special emphasis on pronouncements about public finances that shape government’s delivery of Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) public services, such as healthcare, rural development and access to water / sanitation. PesaCheck also tests the accuracy of media reportage. To find out more about the project, visit pesacheck.org.

PesaCheck is an initiative of Code for Africa, through its innovateAFRICA fund, with support from Deutsche Welle Akademie, in partnership with a coalition of local African media and other civic watchdog organisations.