The Labour Party campaign council on Sunday has confirmed the authenticity of the viral leaked audio between Peter Obi, its presidential candidate, and David Oyedepo, the founder of Winners Chapel.
According to the audio clip, Obi called Bishop David Oyedepo of Living Faith Church (Winners’ Chapel) on the eve of the election and implored him to pass messages to Christians across the South-West — and also to those in central states like Kwara, Kogi and Niger.
Obi in the viral clip begged the cleric to speak to the Christians in the south-west and Kwara to vote for him in the presidential poll, describing the election as a “religious war”.
“Daddy, I need you to speak to your people in the South-West and Kwara, the Christians in the South-West and Kwara,” Mr Obi said in the audio obtained by The Gazette. “This is a religious war.”
“I believe that, I believe that, I believe that,” Mr Oyedepo said.
“Like I keep saying: if this works, you people will never regret the support,” Mr Obi said with candour, adding that Christians in places like Kogi, Kwara and Niger have been difficult to penetrate.
“We look forward to God’s intervention,” Mr Oyedepo said, promising to circulate more messages to Christians on Mr Obi’s behalf.
While some Obi supporters described the audio as fake, Kenneth Okonkwo, a spokesperson of the LP campaign in a series of post on his twitter handle confirmed it to be authentic.
He however said: “political criminals are trying to spin the conversation as if the LP candidate was making a religious comment”.
Our attention has been drawn to the publication of this audio tape of private conversation between @PeterObi and Bishop Oyedepo. It is not surprising that these political criminals are trying to spin the conversation as if Obi was making a religious statement,” Okonkwo said.
“Firstly, the context of the conversation was aptly put by Bishop Oyedepo when he said ‘All Nigerians have equal stake in this nation, nobody has the right to claim that he is dashing something to someone’.
“H E @PeterObi was simply urging the Bishop to help him push this message of equal stake of all Nigerians in the Nigerian project to his people and the Christendom because the politicians of the other party are carrying on this campaign as if it is a religious war.
“To drive home this point, he informed him that he visited the traditional ruler of Offa, the Olofa of Offa, who is a Muslim, but who advised Obi to get the support of Oyedepo and be assured of his own support. No politician has ever visited the Olofa of Offa.
“It is clear to everybody that the APC political party that has a presidential candidate, vice presidential candidate, senate president, speaker of the house of representatives, deputy speaker of the house of representatives, national chairman of the party all from one religion.”
According to Okonkwo, it is the ruling party that has declared religious war on Nigerians. He added that Nigerians “must all rise up together to fight this unconstitutional act of religious intolerance of other religions by APC.”
“I went around with Obi on campaign train and never saw him discriminate against any religion. Of course he can’t because his Vice is a Muslim unlike APC.
“I went around with Obi on campaign train and never saw him discriminate against any religion. Of course he can’t because his Vice is a Muslim unlike APC.
VERIFICATION
FIJ subjected the audio to a deepfake test using Deepware, an AI tool used to detect alterations in audios and videos.
Deepware’s deepfake detection technology “was designed to detect deepfake videos or, simply, any fake content in the areas of visual and audio communication“.
According to Deepware, the Obi-Oyedepo audio was not AI-generated, and it underwent no technological alterations.
It also analysed the voices in the audio and found unique characteristics that are almost impossible to replicate in deepfakes.
FIJ was able to establish that no AI was used in generating the voices or modifying the audio, and made efforts that ultimately proved unsuccessful to reach both men for comments.
VERDICT: The audio is not a deepfake.
