Next week in Kenya there will be elections, people will be choosing their new leaders and there is already a considerable amount of negative conversations people having and sharing on the Social Media i.e Facebook, Twitter and so forth, that may influence the elections. According to the latest statistics from the Communications Authority of Kenya, the country has 40.5 million Internet users which is a huge percentage of the population. People will air out their opinions about the various leaders that have come forward to be chosen and there will be articles and media about them that will be shared on social media sites.
However there is an emerging problem: Social media sites can be used by people to spread false information, which is bad for both the accused and for the electorate on the ground and the Kenyan government is particularly keen on curtailing such practices. A way of curtailing the spread of false information on the Internet is by shutting it down during the elections. This could mean that people would have to rely on VPNs to connect to the Internet so that they can keep up with what is happening around the country in networks like Twitter which actually gave them their own dedicated hashtags for the elections.
Well, the Communications Authority of Kenya seems to have confirmed that they won’t shut down the Internet via a tweet from their official account.
2 Comments
I think the government has done the right thing for not shutting down the internet. I wish Kenya a free and fair election.
It doesn’t matter what the Internet is or was used for during the elections, one thing people need to bear in mind is that a free country like Kenya where freedom of speech is also entrenched in their constitution, should allow people to express their minds online. That’s the only way by which the masses can reach the government and it should be maximized.