Kperogi debunks online claims linking Naval Officer Yerima to retired Gen. M.M. Yerima

Kperogi debunks online claims linking Naval Officer Yerima to retired Gen. M.M. Yerima

United States–based journalism professor and columnist, Farooq Kperogi, says recent claims circulating on social media—and echoed by AI chatbots—linking Lt. A.M. Yerima to retired Major General M.M. Yerima are false.

In a commentary, Kperogi revealed that a social media contact familiar with the naval officer reached out to clarify that Lt. Yerima is not the son of the retired general, contrary to widespread online speculation. The clarification followed Kperogi’s earlier analysis in which he had suggested a possible elite military lineage.

According to Kperogi, despite the persistent claims amplified by platforms such as Google’s Gemini, a retired general who personally knows M.M. Yerima confirmed that the two men are not related.

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Additional information obtained by the columnist revealed that Major General M.M. Yerima hails from Bade Local Government Area of Yobe State, while Lt. A.M. Yerima is from Gujba Local Government Area. Kperogi learned that the naval officer was born in Port Harcourt to a businessman father.

He noted that this explains the geographical proximity referenced in FCT Minister Nyesom Wike’s recent public clash with the officer. Wike, who graduated from the Rivers State University of Science and Technology in 1997, would have been in the same city at a time when Yerima was a five-year-old primary school pupil.

Kperogi added that it remains unclear when Yerima’s family eventually relocated to Kaduna.

Reflecting on the episode, the professor warned that AI systems often reproduce falsehoods when fed with inaccuracies from social media.

“The larger informational lesson for me is that AI chatbots are only as reliable as the information humans circulate,” he wrote, noting that many people assumed a familial connection between the two Yobe-born men simply because they share a surname.

Kperogi stressed that AI repeatedly amplified the unfounded claim because it mirrored the volume of misleading posts online.

Kperogi debunks online claims linking Naval Officer Yerima to retired Gen. M.M. Yerima

Farooq Kperogi is a renowned columnist and United States-based Professor of Journalism.