By Pascal Ibe

Introduction

A few days ago, a video showing a lady addressing the United Bank for Africa (UBA) chairman, Tony Elumelu, simply as “Tony” during a UBA event triggered a storm of reactions on social media.

The incident occurred during an interactive session at the bank’s Graduate Management Accelerated Programme (GMAP) graduation ceremony.

The lady, who is said to be an employee at UBA, had stood up to speak and greeted the UBA boss with the words, “Good morning, Tony.”

Elumelu initially appeared to think she had said “Toyin” before realising that she was actually addressing him as Tony.

He then stopped her and made it clear that she should address him as Mr Elumelu or TOE, rather than Tony.

The billionaire businessman also said he did not subscribe to what he described as that kind of “Oyinbo life.”

What appeared to be a brief exchange, however, quickly exploded online.

The video went viral, with Nigerians having mixed reactions to it.

While some critics accused her of being disrespectful, others came to her defence, arguing that corporate environments often encourage employees to address senior executives by their first names.

Claim

However, an image which claims to show Elumelu meeting and reconciling with the lady has been trending since Saturday, 22 August.

Influencers on Facebook, the X platform, Instagram and many news websites have published the image and claimed that Elumelu has met and reconciled with the lady after the online backlash.

On X,  a user, @MasterBolaji (Bolaji Fesomade) posted the photo with a caption that reads, “Tony Elumelu and the young woman who called him by his first name during a UBA Graduate Management Program have settled their differences and reconciled.

Thank you, Mr Chairman, sir @TonyOElumelu.”

A popular radio anchor and presenter in Anambra State, Nigeria’s South-east, Ifeanyi Orakwe, known as Huge Man, also shared the image on his Facebook page and wrote, “Remember The Young Girl That Called Tony Elumelu By His First Name 👉 “Tony”

“The Heirs Holding Chairman Tony Elumelu Has Finally Reached Out To Her  

“I Believe He Did So To Put A Stop To The Backlash The Young Lady Has Been Receiving On Social Media Since The Video Went Viral.” 

The image alongside the claim appeared here, here and here.

Verification

However, FACTWATCH Nigeria subjected the image to an Image Reverse Search website. The results indicated that the image first appeared on Instagram on 5 July.

From the Image Reverse website, we clicked on the Instagram page and discovered that the image was among the many photos shared by Elumelu on his official Instagram page.

The page captioned the images:  “So proud of our dear Oge as she successfully convened the first edition of the @africaeverywherefestival 

“The beginning of many more to come ❤️

“#TOEWay #AfricaEverywhereFestival”

The same images and post were also published on Elumelu’s Facebook page on the same day.

Where did the image come from?

This trending image and others were from an event, Africa and Everywhere Festival, which was inaugurated by Oge Elumelu, daughter of the UBA chairman, on 4 July.

The first edition of the Africa and Everywhere Festival, was a gathering born of her fast-growing podcast and built to turn a large online following into something more concrete. 

Conceived as a working recruitment pipeline for young Africans, the festival opened with an internship drive that had already drawn more than 7,000 applications for its first cohort, and it set out to move a chosen few of them into real roles before the day was over.

Verdict

Investigations by FACTWATCH Nigeria revealed that the image which claims to show the meeting and reconciliation between Elumelu and the lady who called him “Tony” in the recent viral clip is FALSE.

The UBA chairman took the picture with a different lady at an event in July.