Politicians play dirty games as day of reckoning beckons
Mombasa Governor Ali Hassan Joho (left) and Suna East MP Junet Mohamed. The video clip shared on Twitter by the two spread like wildfire days leading up to next week’s elections before it was deleted, but the damage had been done.
The video clip shared on Twitter by Mombasa Governor Ali Hassan Joho and Suna East MP Junet Mohamed spread like wildfire days leading up to next week’s elections before it was deleted, but the damage had been done.
It had already been picked up by various social media users, generating fear and anger on WhatsApp and other sites where it is being freely shared.
It is fake. It shows Deputy President William Ruto purportedly issuing threats to non-Kalenjin residents in his Uasin Gishu County stronghold, but many of those who have come across it cannot easily tell that it is has cleverly been edited to completely reverse what he was saying.
He was giving an assurance that Kikuyu, Luo, Luhya and other communities who have made the county their home are completely safe and free to go about their lives without fear. He was calling on all people in the region to unite and live together ahead of Tuesday’s polls.
Ethnic-political violence
Given the history of ethnic-political violence in that part of the country, it was a timely message, but once turned upside down it could only serve to bring back memories of a very dark past, and depict Dr Ruto in very poor light.
If the intention was to spread fear and maybe even incite ethnic hatred, the clip may have achieved its objective, as have hundreds of other manipulated videos and images being spread on social media by campaigns of both the main presidential candidates.
Dr Ruto’s United Democratic Alliance (UDA) Wednesday petitioned the National Cohesion and Integration Commission (NCIC) over what it termed as “hate speech, incitement to violence, misinformation and disinformation online by Azimio coalition party officials and constituent party”.
In a letter to the commission by UDA Secretary-General Veronica Maina, the party accused Mr Mohamed and Mr Joho of circulating a choreographed version of a video clip through their official Twitter handles in a bid to “cause, elicit and spread hate, incitement to violence, ethnic discrimination and disharmony.”
“The video has also been intentionally edited with a deliberate aim and objective to cause ethnic hatred, fear and intolerance during this peak political season,” Ms Maina said, asking the commission to act to have the offensive videos taken down.
The fake videos and pictures are made and disseminated by shadowy, anonymous characters always available to offer their services in the electioneering period. But when they are posted or shared by known senior operatives from either of the campaigns, they assume some kind of official imprimatur.
Mr Joho and Mr Mohamed are not the random groupies and activists in Azimio la Umoja candidate Raila Odinga’s campaign, but senior figures slated for bigger things should he become president.
Mr Joho is serving out his second and final term as Mombasa governor, and has been designated as Lands Cabinet Secretary in a possible Odinga government. Mr Mohamed is the Azimio secretary-general, and has been a constant presence by Mr Odinga’s side at nearly every campaign rally across the country.
It might thus be easy to conclude that the scaremongering and incitement the two indulged in by sharing the faked video enjoyed the approval of Mr Odinga, or at least his campaign machinery.
The hateful messaging on social media is not one-sided. The campaign environment has experienced a sharp rise in the spread of fake images, audio and video clips in the final days leading to the elections of next week.
Influence voting patterns
The images, presumed to be from the dark arts campaign teams of both Mr Odinga and Dr Ruto, are being used in last-minute attempts to spread fear and influence voting patterns.
While some have been easy to pick out as outright fakes, like the spread of photo-shopped images of Mr Odinga wearing a UDA branded t-shirt, others call for use of verification tools to ascertain the truth of their content.
An image of Nairobi gubernatorial candidate Polycarp Igathe mending shoes as a cobbler that was shared on Kiambu News Facebook page accompanied by the caption ‘Would you like Polycard Igathe Kamau to make your shoes???’ had also been photo-shopped to match those of his then adopted unconventional campaign tactics that saw him mingle feely with Kenyans while serving them in hotels, cleaning and attending to them in matatus and so forth.
In another clip shared on July 26 by @omwambaKE, Mr Odinga is portrayed as partying while holding a glass of wine and engaging some men in a heated laughter as his main opponent, Dr Ruto, was attending the presidential debates at the Catholic University of Eastern Africa (CUEA) in Karen on July 26.
Original clip
The original clip had been shared in 2019 way before Mr Odinga declared his presidential bid.
On the same night, a false poster claiming that a Kenya Power and lighting Company engineer Eric Kibet had been arrested in Chebiemit in Elgeyo-Marakwet for switching off the main grid was circulated online in an attempt to have the government blamed for power failure experienced in parts of the country during the debate.
On August 1, Kimilili MP Didmus Barasa, a key Ruto ally in western Kenya, shared a fake audio clip claiming that Mr Junet Mohamed was attempting to rig this year’s elections in a conversation with an IEBC official.
Past images of police anti-riot water cannon trucks have also resurfaced, with accompanying false caption that they are headed to the Ruto strongholds ahead of the polls. The fact is that one picture was taken on January 31, 2016 at GSU Headquarters in Ruaraka when the trucks were officially handed over to the police to aid in the fight against crime; and the other on July 17, 2017 next to Ambank House along university way ahead of deployment to volatile regions.
Queen Elizabeth II
In yet another viral image, Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II is portrayed as supporting Dr Ruto dressed in a yellow suit inscribed with a UDA party logo, a false image that has been edited from an earlier image of Her Majesty at the Royal Ascot’s Opening Day, a horse racing even.
In yet another manipulated clip, Cotu Secretary-General Francis Atwoli is depicted as renouncing Mr Odinga.
In April, Mozilla tracked down more than 30 Tiktok accounts found to have published videos that contained hate speech, incitement and other falsehoods.
