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| - A claim that Dame Patience Jonathan, the former Nigerian first lady and wife of ex-President Goodluck Jonathan, fought for females to be admitted into the Nigerian Defence Academy has surfaced online.
READ : 2023 election: Jonathan urges Nigerians to shun fake news, hate speech
This claim, which was contained in a tweet by a Twitter user with the username: @sabiboiharry, read:
“So, it was Patience Jonathan that fought and made females admissible into the Nigerian Defense Academy. Before, only males were admitted. I’m not Ijaw, I’m just appreciating feats.”
The tweet posted on Sunday, April 9, 2023 has gained traction with over 500,000 views, more than 1,500 retweets and over 8,500 likes as of April 13, 2023.
CLAIM
Patience Jonathan fought for females to be admitted into the Nigerian Defence Academy.
THE FINDINGS
Findings by The FactCheckHub show that the claim is MISLEADING.
The Nigerian Defence Academy (NDA) is a military-run degree-awarding institution based in Kaduna State, North-Western Nigeria.
The tertiary institution trains officer-cadets for commissioning into any of the three services of the Nigerian Armed Forces: the Army, the Navy, and the Air Force.
The then Nigerian President and Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces, Goodluck Jonathan, had on the 14th of February, 2010 ordered that the NDA commences the enlistment and training of female regular combatant officers, Daily Trust reported. This was also corroborated by a news report published by The Cable years later.
READ ALSO : FACT CHECK: Jonathan or Buhari, who launched the first made-in-Nigeria drone?
Then President Jonathan also reiterated this when he attended the 7th Summit of the African First Ladies Peace Mission (AFLPM) in Abuja on July 26, 2012, Vanguard reported.
A fact-check published by Dubawa also indicated that the NDA began the admission of female cadets in 2011, following Jonathan’s earlier directives.
Channels TV had also reported that the NDA graduated its first set of female cadets in October 2016.
As of the time of filing this check, there was no credible media report that indicated that Jonathan’s wife, Patience, fought for the admission of females into the NDA.
The FactCheckHub observed that the female admission into the NDA was also not associated with any directive or programme from the office of the First Lady during Jonathan’s administration.
THE VERDICT
The claim that Patience Jonathan fought for females to be admitted into the NDA is MISLEADING; findings revealed that her husband, Goodluck Jonathan, in 2010 gave the directives that led to the admission of females into the institution during his tenure as Nigeria’s president. It was not associated with any directive or programme from the office of the First Lady during his administration.
Seasoned fact-checker and researcher Fatimah Quadri has written numerous fact-checks, explainers, and media literacy pieces for The FactCheckHub in an effort to combat information disorder. She can be reached at sunmibola_q on X or [email protected].
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