Misrepresenting statistical data can significantly alter its meaning and public perception. On March 31, 2026, during an audio broadcast titled “Ten years without assessment, part 4,” disseminated by the online media platform Be Africa, Beninese opposition figure in exile, Martin Rodriguez, asserted that in Benin, “over 45% of children under 5 years old die from malnutrition.”
To substantiate his claim, Rodriguez stated that his figures originated from United Nations reports. He explicitly encouraged listeners: “I read a United Nations report, two reports. One is about child mortality. It’s on the internet, everyone listening, type it on your phone, go to Google,” before presenting his specific child mortality rate linked to malnutrition.
Context of the controversial statement
The Be Africa publication, “Ten years without assessment, part 4,” emerged amidst the intense electoral campaign leading up to the presidential election scheduled for April 12, 2026. Within the discussions featured on Be Africa’s channels, Martin Rodriguez, a prominent Beninese businessman and staunch opponent currently living in exile, delivered a scathing critique of Patrice Talon’s administration over the past decade in Benin. Rodriguez initially declared, “We have experienced an increase in poverty; poverty has grown,” before introducing his statistic concerning child mortality. These allegations were initially part of a longer debate published two days prior on Be Africa’s YouTube channel before appearing on Facebook.
Despite the reference to the United Nations, the assertion that “over 45% of children under 5 years old die from malnutrition” in Benin is factually incorrect.
Online research unveils the actual data
Following Martin Rodriguez’s recommendation, our fact-checking process began with a Google search using keywords such as “malnutrition, mortality, children, 5 years, Benin.” A subsequent search was conducted using Rodriguez’s exact statement: “over 45% of children under 5 years old die from malnutrition.”
Both searches consistently led to an advocacy brief published on the UNICEF-Benin website, titled “Malnutrition: A risk factor for mortality and morbidity in children.” This document, dated April 30, 2020, presents a statistic distinct from the one put forth by the Beninese opposition leader. It clearly states that “Malnutrition constitutes the greatest risk factor for mortality and morbidity in young children in Benin” and that “it accounts for 45 percent of all child deaths annually among children under 5 years old.” This same UNICEF statistic was also referenced in an article by the specialized health website Allo Docteurs, published on November 18, 2024, and updated on June 25, 2025, which reported that “chronic malnutrition is responsible for 45% of deaths of children under 5 each year.”
UNICEF Benin clarifies and refutes Rodriguez’s figures
As part of our verification efforts, we reached out to the UNICEF representation in Benin. Contacted via email on Tuesday, March 31, 2026, UNICEF Benin explicitly disavowed the data attributed to it by Martin Rodriguez.
Regarding the claim: “Over 45% of children under 5 years old die from malnutrition” in Benin, Dorothée Thiénot, Head of Communication for UNICEF-Benin, unequivocally stated, “Phrased this way, this sentence is false and does not correspond to how the United Nations, including UNICEF, presents data.” Thiénot highlighted a crucial nuance: “we are talking about the proportion of deaths of children under 5 where malnutrition is an underlying or aggravating factor, and not the proportion of all children who die of malnutrition.”
When questioned about UNICEF Benin’s 2020 advocacy brief, which indicated that “malnutrition constitutes the greatest risk factor for mortality and morbidity in young children in Benin” and “it accounts for 45 percent of all child deaths annually among children under 5 years old,” Thiénot clarified, “This wording was based on the estimates available at the time, largely consistent with international analyses that attribute approximately 45% of deaths of children under 5 worldwide to undernutrition.”
In any case, the Head of Communication for UNICEF Benin emphasized, “it is not about saying that ‘45% of children die’ due to malnutrition before the age of 5 in Benin.” Thiénot firmly concluded, “This is a misinterpretation.” Concerning the current reality of child mortality in Benin, Thiénot explained that “Available data is not presented as a ‘mortality rate specific to malnutrition’ for Benin, but rather as: an under-5 mortality rate (number of deaths per 1,000 live births).”
