February 14, 2022

False: The image doesn’t show Tigrayan mothers digging trench

HAQCHECK

HaqCheck looked into the picture used to support the claim and rated it FALSE.

Avatar: Saba Habtu
By Saba Habtu

Saba is a junior fact-checker at HaqCheck.

False: The image doesn’t show Tigrayan mothers digging trench

A Facebook account with more than 100,000 followers posted an image on Feb 02 claiming to show Tigrayan mothers (whom it labeled ‘traitors’) digging trenches at a place called Aredo in Afar front in an effort of helping  TPLF war efforts in the Afar regional state. By the time this article was published it had more than one thousand reactions and was shared nearly two hundred times. Other Facebook accounts also posted it with the same claim.

However, HaqCheck looked into the picture used to support the claim and rated it FALSE.

The war between TPLF and the federal government of Ethiopia has been ongoing for more than a year now. After the Ethiopian federal forces left Mekelle, Tigray’s capital, TPLF forces started to advance southward to neighboring Amhara and Afar regions. 

A fresh counteroffensive led by PM Abiy Ahmed from the frontlines was launched and freed areas that were under TPLF’s control. Marking the end of the operation led by the Prime Minister,  the government announced that its forces won’t advance further to Tigray and will be positioned at the borders. 

There had been accusations by the TPLF that there were engagements with forces of  the federal government and its allies on trying to advance into Tigray on different fronts. President of the Afar region, Awel Arba also accused TPLF of opening a fresh offensive on Afar.

The post appeared on facebook in light of this scenario claiming to show that Tigrayan mothers are helping TPLF in digging fortresses.

HaqCheck interrogated the image used to support the claim and found out that it is an old picture posted on Apr 12, 2019 on Facebook with a caption that people in Raya, Tigray Regional State were making terraces for water conservation and soil erosion prevention. 

Therefore HaqCheck rated the claim as FALSE.