Code of Principles

A commitment to Non-partisanship and Fairness

The purpose of Debunk Media Initiative is to promote a balance in storytelling by providing factual information to everyone that might need it. Due to that fact, the organisation is a non-profit and does not in any way allow the siding/favouring of political parties or falling at anyone’s side.

We are non-partisan in that we never support or oppose any candidate of a political party; political in that Debunk does act on those governmental issues selected by its members and on which a position has been reached through study and goes ahead to debunk.

We do not concentrate our fact-checking on any one side. We follow the same process for every fact-check and let the evidence dictate the conclusions. Our fact-checkers and anyone that works for Debunk Media Initiative are advised and briefed on biases and activism in order for their judgement to be objective and transparent. Debunk Media Initiative is to solely state the facts for its audience and let them make their own decision.

All funding, partnerships or collaborations are clearly stated/acknowledged publicly and any kind of support that does not align with our goals and vision as an organisation is not accepted

All Debunk Media Initiative directors, team members, staff, consultants and collaborators are asked about their current involvement in any political party. Our work of non-partisanship is discussed regularly at team meetings and members are all required to ensure that their personal communication on social media meets these standards. We do not take any political stand on any issue other than promoting access to accurate information. Debunk Media Initiative has never had and never will support any political party.

We assess the work of all our external partners before any work is commissioned from them. This is done to ensure that our partners are cleared of any actual or perceived bias and that their work is deemed credible and non-partisan. We continue to assess their work for us and others during the time they are working with us to ensure compliance with our non-partisan stance.

We state this clearly in our code of conduct for non-partisanship

A commitment to Standards and Transparency of Sources

We want our readers to be able to verify the findings themselves. We mention our sources in all our findings in enough detail that readers can replicate our work, except in cases where a source’s personal security could be compromised. In such cases, we provide as much detail as possible to debunk the claims. All sources are identified in every fact-check and links to their work cited or experience shared within.

Debunk Media Initiative also considers having more than one source while debunking a claim. In any case, if one source is enough and solely relevant to the fact check, then the fact checker is allowed to have that arrangement.

Experts are contacted via email, calls and messages to support the research made in relation to the claim. Prior to contact, experts are assessed based on who they are, and their experience, are they objective or compromised? Once these facts are established, these experts become vital candidates for the fact check. Information shared by experts or within the research is also scrutinised with the same standard of checking as the claims being fact-checked.

A commitment to Transparency of Funding & Organisation

Debunk Media Initiative is Uganda’s first independent fact-checking organization using multimedia projects to spread facts across different regions in Uganda.

Today, Debunk Media Initiative serves facts through different collaborations to create a world where people access factual information in real-time in order to support informed decision-making. Debunk Media Initiative started in 2020 as a project by Media Challenge Initiative countering Covid-19 falsehoods during the global epidemic and in 2021, became a fully registered independent organisation.

A commitment to Standards and Transparency of Methodology

Debunk Media Initiative encourages its readers to send claims to fact-check and are transparent on why and how we fact-check. Claims are sent through the Debunk Bot or monitored through mainstream/social media and then discussed with Editorial if they are fact-checkable or not. The claim in many cases is toiling with emotions, inciting violence, creating unhealthy behaviour or seeking to eat away financially and mentally from its victims.

The claim has to have the potential to impact its target audience or have a number of people sharing it and using it to inform others lest we amplify its presence online by debunking it. The original source is contacted, mostly through the platform from which this information was shared. Their response can inform the background of the fact check but even without it, in case they refuse to respond, the team will still go ahead to fact check these claims to better inform the public.

For the safety of the fact-checker/researcher, some of the sources of the claim are not contacted but this does not affect the proceeding of the research and fact-checking of the claim.

Main concepts and keywords are described and explained in the fact check. Background research is made and different tools are used to single out how this information has been used by different people or organisations, still to inform impact.

Share With Us Claims You Have Encountered. While we are able to Check this claim and provide evidence, not every claim/ information is fact-checkable. Here are the criteria we follow

You can share your claim now using our bot or email

A commitment to an Open & Honest Corrections Policy

Debunk Media Initiative creates and edits journalistic content in form of fact checks and we aim for transparency in our work. All claims/ fact checks done are mostly sourced from the internet. These are included in our audio, and video content for readers, listeners and viewers to see original communication from the claimant.

Debunk Media Initiative corrects clearly and transparently in line with the corrections policy, seeking as much as possible to ensure that readers see the corrected version on any fact-check or mistake flagged by followers. Should you believe that we are violating the IFCN Code Of Principles, you may inform the IFCN by reporting the error on their site with evidence or by Emailing factchecknet@poynter.org

Please do not hesitate to flag any mistakes through our social media accounts or by emailing us thedebunk@gmail.com. Go to our corrections page where you will easily report any errors in our work or fact checks. We will respond to your query immediately with corrections and acknowledgement of mistakes made and those addressed varying in need; We will specify how we were made aware of our mistake and when we updated the story (video, audio or written). When needed, we will explain what led us to make the error and be clear about the flaws in the original version.

While we are open to correcting these mistakes, there should be legitimate reasons with evidence as to why you need us to change our facts/work. We are only eligible to fact-check information but not incite activism, or policy change.

Social Media

Any article that is corrected on our website will be republished on all the official Debunk Media Initiative social media accounts it was originally shared on with a clear indication that the article was updated and corrected.

On Facebook, we will edit the original post with an indication of the correction made.
On Twitter, we will share the corrected version of the article with a new tweet. Debunk will reply to that tweet with an image of the correction for transparency. We will delete the original erroneous tweet to avoid spreading misinformation.
Debunk will give a correction where possible on other distributed platforms