Photo: Screenshot of the video
Several foreign fact-checkers published that the video is not of Zelenskyy, but of Pablo Acosta. He is a dancer, teacher of dance, and choreographer from Argentina and he published the video himself on 1st June. On the platform, there are several other of his dance videos. Zelenskyy and Acosta look alike, so when the video is of lower resolution – as is the case with the video clip on this Facebook post – the resemblance seems even bigger, writes Truthmeter.mk.
Under the content-sharing agreement between Truthmeter.mk and Meta.mk, we republish the text below:
We are fact-checking a post on the social network Facebook (screenshot here) sharing a video clip claiming that it features the Ukrainian President, Volodymyr Zelenskyy belly-dancing in a glittering costume. The post is offensively saying:
Every time you need more money, you have to give them a good show. The monkey expert.
The post carries the narrative of personal attacks on Zelenskyy, which has been present for a long time, implying that a former showman cannot run a country as president. This narrative is being shared in direct collision with the clearly expressed will of the Ukrainian citizens, who elected Zelenskyy for president in democratic elections, and also in collision with his strong and determined position to defend his motherland from Russia’s unprovoked invasion.
However, Zelenskyy is not featured in the video shared in the post. The original video is of the dancer Pablo Acosta. The video was posted by Josh Pray on his Instagram profile on 1st June 2023.
Fact-checkers from Teyit, Turkey, explain that the video is not of Zelenskyy, but of Pablo Acosta.
Zelenskyy and Acosta look alike, so when the video is with lower resolution, as is the case with this video clip posted on Facebook, the resemblance seems even bigger. The video was shared to ridicule Zelenskyy and present him as a trivial person, especially since the video was spread in the period when Ukraine undertook its counter-offensive to the Russian military invasion.
Fact-checkers from Disinfo Chronicle write that the video started spreading on Russian profiles on Facebook and Tik Tok.
Also, Reuters’ fact-checkers publish that the video is not of Zelenskyy, but of Pablo Acosta. He is a dancer, dance teacher and choreographer from Argentina and he published the video himself on 1 June. There are also other similar dance videos of his on the platform.
For quite some time now on social networks various videos are shared, that allegedly feature Zelenskyy (aiming to show him as a trivial person), but he does not appear in those videos. Such is the case with this example.
However, there is an actual video where Zelenskyy is the winner of the show 2006 Dance with the Stars.
Due to all of the above-noted facts, we assess that the video spread with this Facebook post is not true and that Ukrainian President Zelenskyy is not in the video.
