By Oluyemi Ogunseyin

American university, the Massachusetts Institute Technology (MIT), has confirmed the certificate of Labour Party’s (LP) governorship candidate in Lagos State, Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour.

Rhodes-Vivour has been at the center of a certificate forgery allegation after an email that purportedly came from the office of MIT registrar appeared on social media claiming he was not a student of the institution.

However, MIT has refuted the claim and confirmed that Rhodes-Vivour attended MIT between 2005 and 2008 and bagged a Master’s Degree in Architecture, Premium Times report disclosed.

Deputy Director, Media Relations, at MIT’s News Office, Sarah McDonnell, said Rhodes-Vivour indeed attended the school and earned a Master’s degree.

“Thank you for reaching out. The MIT Registrar’s Office can confirm that Rhodes-Vivour attended MIT from 2005 to 2008 and earned a Master of Architecture degree,” Ms McDonnell wrote.

In another email, Ms McDonnell was asked if the initial one that claimed that Rhodes-Vivour did not attend the school emanated from the record office.

McDonnell confirmed the authenticity of the mail, noting that it indeed emanated from MIT. She, however, claimed that the record office initially ran a search using a “variation of Mr Rhodes-Vivour’s name that did not match the information in MIT’s database.”

Meanwhile, Rhodes-Vivour had himself via his Twitter handle reacted to the forgery allegation as fake news and another attempt by his opponents to divert attention from issue-based campaigns.

“This is untrue and another failed strategy the opposition is using to divert your attention from having an issue-based campaign,” Rhodes-Vivour tweeted.