MFJI student Adnan Sidibé wins fact-checking award

“80% of those affected by the climate crisis are women,” read a Facebook post by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). Not true – concluded Adnan Sidibé, after fact-checking this statement. Sidibé works for Fasocheck, DW Akademie's long-standing partner organization in Burkina Faso. In Ouagadougou, the organization runs an established news verification training center for media professionals. This semester, Sidibé is on a scholarship with the new French-language “Master francophone en journalisme international,” DW Akademie’s master program in cooperation with École Publique de Journalisme de Tours at the University of Tours. 

Not afraid of big names  

Sidibé checked the UN Development Programme's online report, which the sister organization referred to in its social media post, and found a different statement: 80 percent of those displaced by climate change are women – and again, no source for this figure is given. After publishing its research, UNDP removed the figure, which had already been quoted by many UN and other renowned international organizations, as well as by the media, from its publications. The reason: the figure could not be traced to any existing statistics. 

Sidibé was honored for his research at the Africa Facts Summit in Accra, Ghana, on October 10 with the coveted “Fact-Check of the Year by a Professional Fact-Checker” award. The 24-year-old Burkinabè beat competition from around 250 applicants from 29 countries. 

The Africa Facts Summit is organized annually by Africa Check, one of the largest and most renowned fact-checking organizations on the African continent.