Nigeria’s Presidency has pushed back against claims that an image showing President Bola Ahmed Tinubu with Rwandan President Paul Kagame was artificially generated, insisting the controversy is rooted in misinformation rather than fact.
The denial followed a wave of online speculation after images of the two leaders circulated widely on social media, triggering debates over their authenticity and whether the reported engagement ever took place.
Questions intensified when users observed a visible Grok watermark on the photographs, linking them to the artificial intelligence chatbot developed by Elon Musk’s xAI.
Consequently, critics concluded that the images may not be genuine.
Earlier disclosures about the engagement had come from the President’s Special Adviser on Information and Strategy, Bayo Onanuga, who referenced the meeting in a post shared on Facebook, further fueling public interest.
However, responding to the growing controversy, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Temitope Ajayi, firmly dismissed the AI narrative, describing it as misleading and inaccurate.
Ajayi said the images were authentic but suffered from poor initial quality due to the device used.
“What happened was simple image enhancement, not artificial image creation,” he said.
According to him, the photograph was taken with a mobile phone during the meeting in Paris, resulting in low resolution.
He explained that image-enhancing software was later applied solely to improve clarity, not to fabricate the scene.
Moreover, Ajayi confirmed that President Tinubu and President Kagame held a private lunch, after which both leaders joined French President Emmanuel Macron for dinner later the same day.
“At no point was artificial intelligence used to generate the image,” he added.
He further criticised the speed with which conclusions were drawn online, noting that basic verification could have prevented the confusion.
“Responsible reporting requires asking questions before publishing assumptions,” Ajayi said.
The Presidency, therefore, urged the public and media practitioners to exercise caution, especially as digital tools increasingly blur the lines between enhancement and fabrication in modern media content.