The Presidency on Monday dismissed claims that a photograph of President Bola Tinubu and Rwandan President Paul Kagame having lunch in Paris was artificially generated.
In a statement, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Temitope Ajayi, confirmed the authenticity of the image.
“The narrative that the picture of Presidents Bola Tinubu and Paul Kagame, taken in Paris yesterday, was AI-generated is not correct,” Ajayi said. “Media reports and social media comments suggesting otherwise misrepresent the facts. The picture is real.”
Ajayi explained that the photograph, initially taken with a mobile phone, had poor quality. The photographer later enhanced it using the Grok application, which caused the watermark to appear.
“The use of Grok was only to improve picture quality. That is not a reason to conclude it was AI-generated,” the statement added.
The Presidency had released the image on Sunday, noting that the two leaders met for lunch in Paris to discuss global affairs and strategies for Africa’s growth. They later had dinner with French President Emmanuel Macron the same evening.
Ajayi criticised social media commentators for drawing premature conclusions, saying they “should have asked questions before arriving at this wrong conclusion.”
