A crack team from the Inspector General of Police (IGP) has arrested a suspect identified as Ifechukwu Dennis for allegedly originating and distributing a cloned voice of President Bola Tinubu.
Dennis was apprehended by operatives in Benin, Edo State, following investigation into the source of the manipulated audio.
The Special Adviser on Information and Strategy to the President, Bayo Onanuga, made the disclosure in a post on his X handle.
“The IGP crack team has arrested Ifechukwu Dennis who originated the fake voice that he passed on to his gullible targets as President Tinubu’s voice. Dennis was arrested in Benin. The police will issue an official statement,” Onanuga wrote.
Recall that on 27 May, the Presidency condemned a video posted by popular social media critic, VeryDarkMan (VDM), in which he allegedly played a leaked voice note of President Bola Tinubu begging opposition politician Peter Obi to step down.
At the time, Onanuga labeled the clip a complete fabrication and called for swift legal action against the social media commentator for spreading deepfake content.
“This VDM needs to face the weight of the law for being the conveyor and disseminator of a fake audio of President Tinubu. This is a clear case of an egregious abuse of the social media platform,” Onanuga had tweeted.
In the controversial viral video, VeryDarkMan was seen playing the audio clip where an AI-generated voice resembling President Tinubu’s voice told Peter Obi, among other things, to step down from the presidential race for him.
Reacting on the evening of the presidency’s condemnation, VeryDarkMan, who revealed he was out of the country at the time, dismissed the allegations. He expressed anger over the position taken by the presidential spokesman and claimed the entire controversy was part of a coordinated agenda by the authorities to target him.
