With the country still hunkered down to escape the sweep of Covid-19, in November last year, Uhuru explained that he had fled social media because of the abuses.
Recall that, Kenya’s President Uhuru Kenyatta used to have the largest following of any African leader on Twitter and Facebook. Then in March 2019 he hit the delete button and was gone.
“You’ve seen I left because…It’s just full of abuses…You sit there reading what people are writing and even lose sleep and start making phone calls,” he said.
Kenya has got easily the most ruthless social media warriors in Africa. Calling themselves #KOT (Kenyans on Twitter), you don’t want to provoke their wrath.
Exploiting the possibilities offered by easily the most free-wheeling political space in East Africa, #KOT threw everything, including the kitchen sink, at Uhuru. If they had their way, they would have run him out of the presidency and country. He is still here. But he’s a different man.
Currently, there is internal warfare in the ruling Jubilee Party, with the President and his inner circle choking off Deputy President William Ruto, as the struggle to succeed him in 2022 intensifies.
Much like Joseph Kabila in the Democratic Republic of Congo favoured a candidate than one from his party in 2019, Uhuru has a political pact with erstwhile rival, opposition veteran Raila Odinga.
