Kenya’s digital space has returned to haunt the Jubilee administration, barely three years after the coalition used it as a springboard to ascend to power in 2013.
In a case of instant poetic justice, the same digital tools used by President Uhuru Kenyatta and his deputy William Ruto to their advantage in the last general election are being used to tear them down.
And it could get worse.
In the run up to the 2013 general election, President Kenyatta was the “coolest” presidential candidate as his digital team exhibited social media skills only second to US President Barack Obama’s in 2008.
DIGITAL VS ANALOGUE
President Kenyatta made his competitors look really analogue. Indeed, it became a contest between “digital (Jubilee) versus analogue (Cord)”.
President Kenyatta even bagged Africa’s President of the Year Award at some point.
Then things started going haywire. Fast-forward to 2015 and Twitter, Facebook and blogs have suddenly become “enemies of the State” with a number of bloggers, tweeps and bloggers detained and charged in court by police for criticizing the government.
On Twitter, government hashtags are quickly hijacked by a disgruntled twitteratti like was in the case of #UhuruIsClean, #RutoIsClean and #NorwaySupportsTerror.
WEBSITE SHUTDOWN
And on Monday, the government was accused of ordering the shutdown of isuhuruinkenya.co.ke, a website that had been launched to mock President Kenyatta’s frequent trips abroad.
Stephen Musyoka, a social media consultant, notes that Jubilee started well with President Kenyatta hard at work.
“You could see his photos being shared by everyone; he was chosen as Africa’s #1 president,” he observes. “Then things started going south.”
He cites rampant corruption as the game-changer.
“His bloggers can’t change the mind of Kenyans online. There were allegations of (State House digital director Dennis) Itumbi using bots and parody accounts. (There are) hashtag against UK (Uhuru Kenyatta) day in day out,” he adds.
Mr Itumbi, , who has previously rejected claims of having bots to fight online war for Jubilee, however, defended the government, saying the online response was welcome.
FEEDBACK NOT BACKLASH
“We see it as feedback not as backlash. We did not expect it to be a monologue where everybody agrees with the government,” he said via phone.
“To me, we have given Kenyans a platform to speak to their leaders directly not through middlemen.”
He noted that Jubilee did not use social media to ascend to power, saying it was just a small component.
“Other Presidential candidates like Peter Kenneth and Martha Karua had far better social media presence than us,” he said.
But Mr Musyoka maintains that the government messed up by taking the war online with little results to show.
“You can buy a hashtag but changing the mindset of a Kenyan who is angry at your presidency is tricky,” said Mr Musyoka.
TWITTER EXECUTIVES
Mr Itumbi said Jubilee’s strategy has worked, revealing that a group Twitter executives will visit Kenya from December 16 to meet with PSCU directors.
“They want to see how we have managed to succeed in using Twitter for feedback and sell it (PSCU’s model) around the world,” he said.