FAKE: What is being said in this post about Prime Minister DR. Abiy Ahmeds’ biography is fabricated news.
This Facebook post claim that Ethiopian Prime Minister (PM) Abiy Ahmed is of Eritrean nationality is FAKE.
The post in English claims “Abiy Ahmed is 100% ERITREAN FamilyTree. Abiy is spreading hate, starting wars & bleeding the treasury to destroy Ethiopia. Two Eritrean Leaders, Abiy Ahmed (Abraha) & Isaias Afwerki hate Ethiopia,”
Adding, “ A DNA TEST will show what his actions already prove. In the end, ERITREA gains & millions of Ethiopians will die for a lie.
Abiy Ahmed (Abraha) is Eritrean …”
However, according to www.nobelprize.org, the PM was born Abiy Ahmed Ali on 15 August 1976, in Beshasha, a town in the Oromia region of Ethiopia. Abiy was born in an interfaith family–his father, Ahmed Ali, was a Muslim, and his mother, Tezeta Wolde, a Christian. Abiy is a Pentecostal Christian.
Also, another website also shows Abiy was born in Beshasha, Ethiopia, and became PM of Ethiopia in 2018.
Abiy studied computer science, leadership, and economics, graduating in 2017 with a doctorate in peace and conflict research at Addis Ababa University.
Abiy was chosen to lead the ruling Ethiopian People Revolutionary Democratic Front coalition after the unexpected resignation of Prime Minister Hailemariam Desalegn in 2018. Abiy was sworn shortly after his election to become Africa’s second-most populous country’s 16th prime minister and the first Oromo to hold Ethiopia’s top seat.
Prior to Abiy’s leadership, Ethiopia and its neighbour, Eritrea, had a protracted conflict over a disputed border area. An international arbitration commission ruled in Eritrea’s favour in 2002, but the then Ethiopian leadership protested the ruling. After 16 years of “no war, no peace” between the two countries, Abiy broke the deadlock and accepted the court’s decision. In September 2018, he and Eritrean President Isaias Afwerki signed a historic peace agreement.
That peace pact earned Abiy a peace prize medal “for his efforts to achieve peace and international cooperation, and in particular for his decisive initiative to resolve the border conflict with neighbouring Eritrea.”
Abiy’s Prosperity Party won the most seats in the country’s 2021 parliamentary election, according to official results, a victory that assures Abiy a second five-year term in office.
Arts Tv has looked into a Facebook post with a written picture claiming Abiy Ahmed’s nationality is Eritrean and finds it to be FAKE.
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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 organizations 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 news 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 ART TV fact-checker Rediet Abera and edited by Partner PesaCheck Fact check Bekalu Kibro, and chief copy editor Eden Berhane. The article was approved for publication by managing editor Enock Nyariki.
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 organizations.