Sanjeeb Phuyal is the Nepali Editor of Newschecker based in Kathmandu, Nepal. He brings over a decade of experience writing and editing news. In his previous stint, he worked as online editor for The Kathmandu Post. With the growth of social media platforms—and the ever-growing competition amongst media outlets to churn out breaking news, he feels that fact-checking every piece of information has become more essential today than ever before.
Claim
KP Sharma Oli said he among other leaders have become old and asked Rabi Lamichhane to take the leadership.
Fact
Viral video shows Oli addressing his party youth wing’s central committee meeting.
A video claiming that Chairman of Communist Party of Nepal-Unified Marxist Leninist (CPN-UML) KP Sharma Oli asked Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) President Rabi Lamichhane to take the country’s leadership enraging Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal is going viral on TikTok.
TikTok user @rabinmogar100 posted a video showing former Prime Minister and CPN-UML Chairman KP Sharma Oli speaking at a program. Text superimposed on the video reads, “Prachanda [Prime Minister and Chairman of CPN (Maoist Centre)] became angry when KP Sharma Oli asked Rabi [President of Rastriya Swatantra Party] to take the country’s leadership.] I liked KP Oli’s opinion. What’s your take on this?” In the video, Oli says, “There are only disappointments and hopelessness. There is no one with a can-do attitude who says I can build the nation. The country is on a road to collapse. Who can do it if not for you? Shouldn’t you work together with a laser-focus and bring the nation on track. For that you need to go amongst the youths and make them conscious and bring them out of despair.” The video shows several leaders from other political parties including Rabi Lamichhane, Rastriya Prajatantra Party lawmaker Gyanendra Shahi and Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal listening to Oli’s speech.
The video posted on November 28 has garnered 20.6k likes, 159 users have shared it and 921 people have commented until the time of publishing this article. The archived version of the TikTok video can be seen here.
Newschecker found the claim to be misleading.
Fact Check /Verification
To check the authenticity of the claim made in the viral video, Newschecker took a keyframe from the viral video and ran a reverse search on it. The search led us to an article whose frames exactly matched the frames from the viral video published on Kathmandu Press online.
The article, dated November 24, 2023, was about Oli’s speech in which he described the despondent situation in the country due to the current coalition government. We found that Oli was addressing his party youth wing Youth Association Nepal’s central committee meeting organised at the UML party office. However, the article didn’t mention anything hinting that Chairman Oli asked Rastriya Swatantra Party President Rabi Lamichhane to take the leadership.
Further, we conducted a search on YouTube by using the clue from the article and found a video, dated November 24, 2023, published on a YouTube channel named Balkot Official. On checking the video of KP Sharma Oli addressing the second full meeting of Youth Association Nepal thoroughly, we found that that audio from 35.47-minute onwards exactly matched the viral video. However, we didn’t find any footage of other party leaders like Rabi Lamichhane and Prime Minister attending the same meeting. It is obviously out of the question for the other party leaders to attend the central committee meeting of a rival party’s youth wing.
Thus, our findings clearly indicate that the viral video showed CPN-UML Chairman KP Oli addressing the party youth wing YAN’s central committee meeting. The video was created by using unrelated footage of other party leaders listening to Oli’s speech.
Conclusion
No, KP Sharma Oli didn’t ask Rastriya Swatantra Party President Rabi Lamichhane to take the leadership and enraged incumbent Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal ‘Prachanda’. The viral video is misleading and created by using unrelated footage.
Result: False
Sources
Kathmandu Press, Nov 24, 2023
Balkot Official/YouTube, Nov 24, 2023
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Sanjeeb Phuyal is the Nepali Editor of Newschecker based in Kathmandu, Nepal. He brings over a decade of experience writing and editing news. In his previous stint, he worked as online editor for The Kathmandu Post. With the growth of social media platforms—and the ever-growing competition amongst media outlets to churn out breaking news, he feels that fact-checking every piece of information has become more essential today than ever before.
