A claim that a rumoured sex competition has commenced in Sweden and can be viewed on Channel 206 on Digital Satellite Television (DSTV) has surfaced online.
The claim is accompanied by a short 12-second footage that appears to depict a sexually explicit sports exhibition.
The video is circulating online, especially in Nigeria, following the rumour that Sweden has officially declared sex as a sport and is set to launch its maiden sex tournament on Thursday, June 8, 2023.
A Twitter user, @cleverlydey4u tweeted a screenshot from the footage with a caption that read: “Check channel 206 on DSTV, The sex competition in Sweden has started.”
The tweet has garnered over 1.3 million views, with over 3,000 retweets and more than 12,000 likes.
Another Twitter user, @Oladapomikky tweeted the same footage with a similar caption that read: “The sex competition in Sweden has started. DStv users check channel 206.”
The tweet has garnered over 700,000 views, over 900 retweets and over 6,000 likes as of June 8, 2023.
CLAIM
Video clip shows sex competition in Sweden broadcast on DSTV.
THE FINDINGS
Findings by The FactCheckHub show that the claim is FALSE.
A Google search using the video’s thumbnail shows that the footage has been online since at least 14 years ago. The earlier versions of the footage are archived here.
According to the commentator in one of the earlier versions of the video, the two athletes are Jackson and Weinberger, representing the United States of America at a gymnastics game in Bucharest, Romania.
The claim about Sweden holding a sex competition has been fact-checked and found to be false by media organisations such as Reuters.
A Swedish publication Goteborgs-Posten had reported that Dragan Bratic, a man who formed “The Swedish Sex Federation,” submitted an application for the organisation to become a part of the Swedish Sports Confederation (RF) in January 2023.
However, the Swedish Sports Confederation rejected the application, according to a press release published on April 26, 2023.
In an email response to Reuters, Anna Setzman, a spokesperson of the Swedish Sports Confederation, debunked the viral reports saying, “it is false information with the aim of smearing Swedish sports and Sweden.”
“The Swedish Sports Confederation has drawn attention to the fact that in some parts of the international media news is currently being spread that a Sex federation has become member of the Swedish Sports Confederation,” she added.
THE VERDICT
The claim that the video shows a sex competition in Sweden on DSTV Channel 206 is FALSE; findings show that the video has been online since 2008.
This is republished from the FactCheckHub, read the original here
Nurudeen Akewushola is an investigative reporter and fact-checker with The ICIR. He believes courageous in-depth investigative reporting is the key to social justice, accountability and good governance in society. You can reach him via [email protected] and @NurudeenAkewus1 on Twitter.