Nairobi News

Tiktok is the social media platform with the highest number of hate speech cases, totaling 20, ahead of Kenya’s August 9, general elections.

This according to a weekly analysts released by the National Cohesion and Integration Commission (NCIC).

Facebook is second with 12 cases compared to 15 cases recorded the previous weeks.

Twitter emerged third with 11 reported cases, up from 6 cases reported in the last analysis.

The social media monitoring on hate speech and incitement analysis was carried on 15th – 21st July 2022, in which the commission says a total of 48 cases of hate speech were recorded.

The data was collected on Telegram and Whatsapp with 4 and 2 cases respectively.

According to NCIC, most of the hate speech and disinformation narratives were observed related to the rise of the hashtags #RejectRailaOdinga, #Riggagy and #Rutomalizaufungwe.

Also, narratives shaming William Ruto, the Kenya Kwanza presidential candidate as an angry person and a continuation of the historical revisionism tactic led to the increase of hate speech cases.

The week under study recorded an increase in recorded cases by 45%

“We observed the highest number of cases on TikTok with a total of 20 cases and also the highest rate of increase of cases, a 400% increase in comparison to the first week (5 to 20 cases). The steady increase in the number of cases on TikTok can be attributed to two main actions: one, there is an actual increase in the number of hate speech cases and two, having a dedicated team looking into hate speech cases only in TikTok results in more cases being identified,” NCIC said in its report.

During the month of July, TikTok, Facebook and Twitter reported over 30 cases each.