Foreign nationals living in South Africa are again fearful of attacks by locals. But widely shared images and videos falsely captioned as xenophobic violence only get in the way of solutions.
South African government officials have met diplomats from other African countries to discuss reported attacks on foreign nationals in the country’s KwaZulu-Natal and Limpopo provinces.
Videos and photos of unrelated events
Graphic videos and photos of violence have been widely shared online with the claim they show xenophobic attacks. Several readers asked Africa Check to find out if they were real.
We were also alerted to similar images on Facebook through our third-party fact-checking programme with the social network.
We found that although they were shared out of concern and to raise awareness, many of the most-travelled videos and photos are of unrelated events. (Note: Some of the videos are graphic and viewer discretion is advised.)
*The views of the above article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of Africa Speaks 4 Africa or its editorial team.