“This is an OLF-Shane soldier spared from execution and is caught by the lions of the Shoa Fano,” reads a post on a Facebook page with more than 24 thousand followers on April 19, 2022.
The post got over 2 thousand reactions and had been shared over 300 times by the time this article was published.
HaqCheck examined the image and declared it False.
Fano is an Amhara youth volunteering to defend the country.
There were different claims that OLF-Shane is attacking villages in different areas of the Amhara region. Social media posts were surfacing regarding OLF-Shane’s attack in Shewa Robit town in north-central Ethiopia located in the Semien Shoa zone of the Amhara Regional State.
According to the reports, the alleged clashes took place on the road from Shewa Robit to Dessie, at the village of Molale, home to more than 10,000 people, which was completely burnt down by OLF-Shane militants.
OLF militias opened gunfire at Shewa Robit Link
Authorities and residents of the area said armed men opened fire causing harm on residents and properties in the Northern Shoa Zone, Ephrata and Gidim Woreda of the Amhara region, as well as in Kewat and Shewarobit areas. link
Amid this situation, another Facebook post by a renowned politician appeared captioned, “The government-backed terrorist group OLF-Shane is carrying out large-scale attacks around Shewa Robit.”
The Oromia Regional State, on its part, disclosed in a statement on Apr 20, that the campaign of eliminating OLF-Shane will continue in a coordinated way. The regional government also stressed that the heinous acts the group is carrying out on the Oromo people testify that it doesn’t have any political objective or goal. Moreover, it was noted that some youth members of the group who accepted the call for peace are surrendering.
The image was also shared on different Facebook and Twitter pages with the same intention of showing an OLF-Shane soldier being surrendered by the Fano militias.
HaqCheck investigated the image and found out that the image was posted on Feb 12, 2022, on a Facebook account with Afaan Oromo language captioned, “prisoning and beating the heroes of many Oromo people in different regions of Oromia… Comrade Abdi Oromo and Oromo nationalists in different parts of Oromo are taken to prison. If they are not released immediately, take action and the attack on cabinets and cadres of Zones and Federal government will be acceptable.”
In the image is pictured a soldier with braided hair suspected to be a member of OLF-Shane hand-tied and surrounded by the Oromia special forces.
The soldiers behind the captive wore the Oromia special forces uniform and held beret hat which is used by the Oromia special forces.
Even though there are several claims about the conflict happening in the Shewa Robit town between the Amhara Fano and the OLF-Shane forces, the image used to support the claim by the Facebook and Twitter pages is proved to be incorrect.
Thus, HaqCheck inspected the image and manifested it as False.
