We agree you should check Africa Check reports (and explain how, too)
Holding up to scrutiny the claims made by leading figures and institutions, such as the Institute for Race Relations (IRR), is the basis of a healthy democracy. And it is worrying to suggest otherwise.
Checking the evidence behind statements of fact is what Africa’s first independent fact-checking website is all about. We research key claims in public debate, making the process we follow clear and pointing readers to our sources so that they can check Africa Check’s findings for themselves.
We were pleased to be told just last week that a recent study by US academics found we had the largest number and widest range of sources of six fact-checking sites studied around the world.
Occasionally this process ruffles a few feathers. The latest case in point? The Institute for Race Relations (IRR).
In May, the institute issued a press release, stating as fact: “There has been a 96% increase in social protests in South Africa since 2010.” It’s complicated, but when we looked into it, we found that the category of events the IRR attached this label to is called “unrest-related crowd incidents” by the police. Limitations to this data just did not support the IRR claim.