Viral video of Donald Trump praising John Mahama, manipulated
By Karen Dodoo Antwi
Claim: A viral video on social media shows the President of the United States, Donald Trump, praising Ghana’s President John Mahama and Finance Minister Cassiel Ato Forson for stabilising the Ghana cedi’s rate against the US dollar.
Verdict: False! The video appears to be manipulated from an original video of an exclusive interview with NBC News uploaded in May 2017.
Full Text
A trending video on TikTok claims that the President of the United States, Donald Trump, has acknowledged the efforts of Ghana’s president John Mahama and Finance Minister Cassiel Ato Forson for their effort in reducing the cedi’s rate against the US dollar.
Bloomberg News adjudged the cedi the world’s best currency in May after it appreciated nearly 16 per cent since the beginning of April 2025.
According to Bloomberg News, the cedi’s gain has helped ease inflationary pressures, contributing to Ghana’s lowest inflation rate in eight months.
As of May 12, 2025, the Bank of Ghana reports the cedi is trading at GH₵12.88 against the dollar.
In the 17-second video, President Trump praises Ato Forson and President Mahama for reducing the cedi rate to the dollar and improving the economy.
“I am Donald Trump; I appreciate Ghana Finance Minister Ato-Forson and John Mahama. The current president of Ghana is making maximum effort to reduce the dollar rate to cedis and strengthen Ghana’s economy,” he is heard saying in the video posted by Agoetv on TikTok.
As of May 13, 2025, the video had garnered 3,471 likes, 101 comments, and 613 shares.
Considering the recent political debate surrounding the appreciation of the cedi against the US dollar, DUBAWA recognises the video’s potential to mislead and misinform, thereby deciding to investigate the claim.
Verification
President Donald Trump is a popular politician, and such a remark would have been reported by credible and popular media outlets. However, DUBAWA searches on outlets like CNN, FOX News, and ABC News did not report this.
The researcher analyzed the video visually and observed that President Trump’s lips moved discordantly with the words being uttered, raising suspicions that the video may have been manipulated.
A further search with keywords such as “Trump praises Ato Forson for Cedi Appreciation” leads to the video from Agoetv on TikTok.
Agoetv has a record of using AI-generated videos to make false claims that DUBAWA has fact-checked. One such video was a manipulated video of Elon Musk promising to establish a Starlink office in Ghana.
Also, given the doubts raised by some users and the apparent anomalies in President Trump’s speech pattern, DUBAWA scrutinised the video using InVid video verification to generate keyframes for reverse image search.
One of the results, however, was traced to an interview posted by NBC News.
The video shows Trump discussing his plans to fire the then-FBI Director, James Comey.
The video was uploaded on YouTube on May 12, 2017, when President Mahama and the ruling government were in opposition. Thus, President Trump could not have praised Mahama’s administration for ensuring the cedi’s stability.
Conclusion
The video claiming that President Donald Trump praised President John Mahama for the appreciation of the cedi against the US Dollar has been digitally altered to share a false narrative. DUBAWA’s findings reveal that the original video is an old interview by NBC News.
The researcher produced this fact-check per the DUBAWA 2025 Fellowship partnership with Bullet TV .
