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
Rabi Lamichhane’s Rastriya Swatantra Party withdrawing its support to the government, Pushpa Kamal Dahal-led government has fallen
Fact
RSP decided to recall its ministers from the government but to continue its support to the government
A video allegedly showing a press meet by Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) President Rabi Lamichhane announcing his party’s decision to pull out support to the Pushpa Kamal Dahal-led coalition government is going viral on TikTok. Newschecker found the claim to be misleading.
The claim surfaces at a time when the speculations are rife whether the cabinet will be reshuffled with the Rastriya Swatantra Party joining the government after the party won two seats in the recently held by-elections. RSP President Rabi Lamichhane was re-elected from Chitwan constituency-2.
TikTok user @kbtamang2020 posted a video showing RSP President Rabi Lamichhane speaking at a press meet. Text superimposed on the video reads, “Rabi’s party [RSP] pulling out support to the government. The government led by Prachanda [Chairman of Communist Party of Nepal Pushpa Kamal Dahal alias ‘Prahanda’] is going to fall. The video captions read the same. In the video, Lamichhane is heard saying, “Our honourable ministers will submit their resignation today itself, and I would like to inform you that we [RSP] have decided to leave the government. I want to put forth my views before you and will take your questions later. I have taken today’s press meeting quite seriously. Do you have any questions regarding this?” Then he goes on to say, “All right, we will move on to the question-answer session later. Actually, what happened was that we participated in the government, and the government was formed according to the people’s mandate. Please keep quiet. Things were developing according to consensus and understanding. But the way things evolved regarding the issue I had officially informed the government four years ago.” The audio suddenly stops. The archived version of the TikTok video can be seen here.
The video posted on May 1 has garnered 38.8k likes, 334 users have shared it and 963 people have commented until the time of publishing this article.
Fact Check /Verification
To check the authenticity of the claim made in the viral video, Newschecker took a keyframe from the viral video and conducted a reverse search which led us to a video of a press meet by RSP President Rabi Lamichhane. The video was posted on the YouTube Channel named Aajako Press on 5 February 2023. We compared the frames and the persons attending the press meet in the viral video and found the videos strikingly similar though the frame angles were different.
Then, we carefully listened to the video and found that the audio from 7.53-minute onwards exactly matched the viral video. We found that the video was from the famous press conference organised by RSP President Rabi Lamichhane to announce his party’s decision to quit the government after Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal refused to re-appointed Rabi Lamichhane as the Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister.
Further, we found an article published on the Kathmandu Post online about the RSP’s decision to quit the government but to continue its support from outside the Cabinet. We found that the image carried by the article also matched the frame of the viral video. The news article confirmed that the party made the decision after Lamichhane was forced to resign as deputy prime minister and home minister following the Supreme Court’s move to annul his status as a lawmaker. The court ruled that the citizenship certificate he produced to contest the November 20 election was invalid.
The Rastriya Swatantra Party won two out of three House of Representatives seats in the by-elections held on April 23. However, the party has not made its position clear whether it will stay in the opposition bench by withdrawing their support to the government or it will become the part of the current Dahal-led coalition government.
Our findings clearly show that the RSP has not made any decision regarding joining the government and continuing its support or staying in the opposition by withdrawing its support to the government.
Conclusion
The viral video purportedly showing RSP president Rabi Lamichhane announcing to pull support to the government is misleading, actually the video shows an old press conference of Lamichhane to announce his party’s decision to quit the government with continued support.
Result: Missing Context
Sources
Aajako Press, 5 February, 2023
The Kathmandu Post, 5 February, 2023
The Kathmandu Post, 29 April, 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.
