A noble laureate, Prof Wole Soyinka, on Wednesday, said fake news may cause World War III if effort was not made to curb it.

He was speaking at a conference on fake news, titled: “Nigeria 2019: Countering Fake News”. It was organized by BBC News.

“I made a statement before that if we are not careful, World War III will be started by fake news and that fake news will be probably generated by a Nigerian,” he said.

He said he had been a victim of fake news, and that numerous false statements had been wrongly attributed to him.

“You may find a statement that was attributed to you in a kind of language which you will never use.

“For example, during the last presidency, statement was attributed to me that I said it serves President Jonathan right for marrying an illiterate woman.

“I never made any comment whatsoever about that lady and suddenly, here it is staring me in the face,” Soyinka said.

He also said, “There are other times, a card had been created and that card comes out on the internet and it said Prof Wole Soyinka says anybody who votes for this person, one, must be stupid, two, must be mentally retarded, three, his mother must be a goat, four, his father must be a gorilla. This comes out all the times.”

He said those who spread fake new were “sick in the head”, “cowards” and “lack conviction.”

•Sourced from a Daily Trust report

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