Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador lit social media on fire on Saturday by sharing a photo that he claimed to be of a mystical elf sitting in a tree.
Obrador also shared a photo of sculptures from a Yucatec-Maya archeological site that he claimed to be of this type of elf.
“I share two photos of our supervision of the Mayan Train works: one, taken by an engineer three days ago, apparently from an aluxe; another, by Diego Prieto of a splendid pre-Hispanic sculpture in Ek Balam. Everything is mystical,” the Mexican president wrote, according to a machine translation.
An Aluxe is a little mythological person that causes mayhem and mischief according to Mayan lore.
The tweet had over five million views by the next day.
Les comparto dos fotos de nuestra supervisión a las obras del Tren Maya: una, tomada por un ingeniero hace tres días, al parecer de un aluxe; otra, de Diego Prieto de una espléndida escultura prehispánica en Ek Balam. Todo es místico. pic.twitter.com/Tr5OP2EqmU
— Andrés Manuel (@lopezobrador_) February 25, 2023
While some social media users embraced the lore and had a good time with it, others quickly got to work debunking Obrador’s elf photo.
“Yes, Andrés, an engineer three days ago took a photo that has been doing the rounds in Nuevo León since February 2021 and in Thailand since December of that year. You are sad, very sad… and the country even more… If you believe it, you are stupid… if you know you are lying, you are malicious…” one Twitter user wrote.
Indeed, the photo previously made the rounds claiming that it was a “witch” spotted in Nuevo León.
The mysterious photo appears to be a type of gibbon, lesser ape, or a langur monkey.
