The Nigerian reported to be among the victims of the Ukrainian plane crash in Iran on the 7 of January 2020 says he is alive.

The alleged dead man in the picture, Adeyeye Olayinka Bernard, whose picture was used on social media and some National dailies, said he was embarrassed and since his life and that of his family had never been the same again as people now look at them with strange faces.

At a media briefing in Lagos Wednesday, Bernard wore the same shirt on the picture used to confirm that he was the person in the fake news published.

He explained that he now wears face caps to cover his face when he walks on the street because he was being called ‘dead man walking’.

According to him, the picture that was used was taken on his birthday with wife and when the picture was used. He received many calls from friends and other family members wondering when he travelled out of the country and started working for Boeing as a trainee.

Bernard said his mother fainted when the picture was shown to her that the son had died in a plane crash.

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Femi Martins, a counsellor to Bernard, described the development as the height of irresponsible blogging and journalism and must be condemned.

According to him, the report was a national embarrassment for the fact that most of the captions of the fake publications had the name of the country Nigeria.

Martins advised that bloggers and media outfits saddled with the task of disseminating information to ensure due diligence by verifying stories at their disposal before disseminating such information to the public.

 

IFEOMA OKEKE

Ifeoma Okeke-Korieocha is the Aviation Correspondent at BusinessDay Media Limited, publishers of BusinessDay Newspapers. She is also the Deputy Editor, BusinessDay Weekender Magazine, the Saturday Weekend edition of BusinessDay. She holds a BSC in Mass Communication from the prestigious University of Nigeria, Nsukka and a Masters degree in Marketing at the University of Lagos. As the lead writer on the aviation desk, Ifeoma is responsible and in charge of the three weekly aviation and travel pages in BusinessDay and BDSunday. She also overseas and edits all pages of BusinessDay Saturday Weekender. She has written various investigative, features and news stories in aviation and business related issues and has been severally nominated for award in the category of Aviation Writer of the Year by the Nigeria Media Nite-Out awards; one of the Nigeria’s most prestigious media awards ceremonies. Ifeoma is a one-time winner of the prestigious Nigeria Media Merit Award under the 'Aviation Writer of the Year' Category. She is the 2025 Eloy Award winner under the Print Media Journalist category. She has undergone several journalism trainings by various prestigious organisations. Ifeoma is also a fellow of the Female Reporters Leadership Fellowship of the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism.

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