The Police on Thursday said it had arrested a comedian, Augustine Valentine, popularly known as `MC Fine’, over alleged spread of fake news.
The Daily Times reports that Mr Biodun Makanjuola, Divisional Police Officer (DPO) of the force in Bwari, FCT, said that Valentine posted a false report on facebook alleging the apprehension of a female kidnapper.
“After investigation, we found the report to be fake,” he said.
NAN reports that the middle-aged woman, simply identified as Zulai, had been attacked on Wednesday, around Zenith Bank area in Bwari, over the suspicion that she had attempted to kidnap a two-year-old male child.
The Police, who were quick to intervene, arrested the woman and, during investigation, found out that she was physically and psychologically unstable.
The DPO told NAN that while the investigation was going on, Valentine posted a misleading information on the incident, on the social media platform.
“When she was brought here, I asked my people to first take her to the General Hospital for medicals. They came back with a medical report indicating that she was suffering from depression.
“The report also referred her to Karu Psychiatric Hospital for proper evaluation. Right now, we are preparing to take her there.
“We were still on the matter when I started receiving calls about a post on Facebook claiming that the woman was a kidnapper. The report claimed that her phone had message conversations on how many children to be kidnapped.
“I made efforts and finally discovered who posted the story, brought him here for questioning, and he confessed he only added some of the details to add glamour to the story.”
The DPO, while expressing displeasure over the incident, cautioned against spreading unverified news, pointing out that such actions could cause negative impact on people involved and result into security breach in the affected community.
“We are working with the affected families to douse the tension. This town can be volatile, so we are not taking anything for granted,” he said.
