Kenyans have been sharing various messages authored by a Twitter account dubbed Tracy Zille which contain controversial opinions about Africans in respect to other races as well as the Covid-19 vaccine.
The posts elicited debate among many Kenyans, including Kenya’s political leaders such as Machakos Governor Alfred Mutua and KFCB CEO Ezekiel Mutua.
However, a spot check by Kenyans.co.ke revealed that Kenyans had fallen victim to the race-baiting and controversial tweets, just as South Africans and Nigerians.
South African authorities established that the fake account was being operated by a man hiding behind a female persona.
In 2020, the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) Commissioner Chris Nissen said they had sufficient evidence of hate speech and that the matter would be referred to the Equality Court.
According to a disinformation expert and investigator working for the Atlantic Council, an American think tank in international affairs, the person running the account deliberately seeks to spark outrage and drive traffic to websites which he has monetized.
The targeted people are more vulnerable to respond to the disinformation when the messages posted confirm their pre-existing biases on race and identity.
“How should you and I respond to this post about you and me? Please read, reflect soberly, think, then comment. Academic discourse or street talk?” Governor Mutua captioned in one of the controversial posts that had been trending.
“Condescending, brass and cocky. Europeans and Americans lack the moral authority to lecture us in such juvenile ranting and ostentatious tone,” KFCB CEO Ezekiel Mutua responded.
A large number of Kenyans stated that the post contained ‘painful truth’ about how Africa was inferior to the rest of the world, which reinforces the pre-existing notions some Africans have about themselves.
The catfish account has so far successfully managed to attract 81,000 followers on Twitter and leverages the attention the controversial posts receive to drive traffic to the websites linked with the account.
“The deployment of racist rhetoric as a lever to propagate disinformation serves to not only undermine legitimate concerns around race and identity but also exacerbate existing racial tensions,” Jean Le Roux, a Digital Forensic Research Lab expert cautioned.
