Great Twitter Purge in Kenya has affected influencers, politicians and celebritirs in Kenya. Some of those infulencers stung by the biggest purge in social media history is Xtian Dela, Cyprian Nyakundi, Uhuru Kenyatta which saw theme lose followers on Twitter.
In efforts to clean up its platform and get rid of inactive and fake users, Twitter has come up with a major change aimed at cleaning up its spammy legacy. This move has seen many celebrities, politicians and so-called social media influencers lose thousands of Twitter followers.
The Twitter purge on locked accounts has caused a worldwide wave that has affected social media influencers, global celebrities and household names.
Kenya’s prominent users on the popular social media platform have not been spared as follower counts have been slashed in the millions.
GOtv Packages Kenya 2023 Prices: Channels, Paybill & Contacts
President Uhuru Kenyatta for example lost over 16,000 followers, with Deputy President William Ruto had close to 7,000 less followers by Friday morning.
The biggest losers known so far seem to be social media influencers Cyprian Nyakundi and Christian Dela. Combined, the two have lost close to 1 million followers.
The worldwide Twitter purge has not spared any of our public figures and social media influencers.
Controversial bloggers Cyprian Nyakundi and Christian Dela are some of the most affected in Kenya.
Nyakundi’s followers have halved, from a whopping 1.2 million to 696,000 while Dela’s numbers now stand at 521,000 from an impressive one million.
The Chairperson of Kenya Film and Classification Board, Ezekiel Mutua, has also lost thousands of followers from 106,000 to 34,000.
With Popular personalities around the world losing over one million followers, Kenya’s most followed person, President Uhuru Kenyatta did not survive the axe. The Head of State lost 16,071 followers while his Deputy, William Ruto, lost 7,211.
On the flip side, former Prime Minister Raila Odinga gained followers from 1,923,245 to 1,923,428.
However, this move by Twitter has not affected corporates.
The Star newspaper however reported that in the midst of the Twitter purge, Raila Odinga has gained over 200 new followers.
Twitter’s latest change in removing locked accounts from being displayed as follower counts on user’s profiles, is a bid by the social networking service to build trust and encourage what it calls “healthy conversations” on its platform.
GOtv Packages Kenya 2023 Prices: Channels, Paybill & Contacts
“Follower counts are a visible feature, and we want everyone to have confidence that the numbers are meaningful and accurate,” said Vijaya Gadde, Twitter’s Legal, Policy and Trust & Safety Lead on Wednesday.
The action has caused Kenyans on Twitter to react under the hashtag #TwitterCleanupKE. Tweets have ranged from analysis and speculation as to whether the so called Twitter bigwigs have been fraudulently bumping up their followership to create a false perception of their actual popularity.
On Thursday, the New York Times reported that former President Barrack Obama, media proprietor Oprah Winfrey and sports star Shaquille O’neal were among the ones affected.
Former President Obama lost around 3 million followers in a day, the New York Times report indicated.
Apart from Oprah (1.4 million followers lost) and O’neal (1 million followers lost), the New York Times also said that Ellen Degeneres, Kim Kardashian West, Rihanna and Katy Perry were also not spared, all losing on average around 2 to 3 million followers.
US President Donald Trump, who is known to be vocal, provocative and brash in equal measure with his tweets also lost 340,000 followers.
Twitter itself was not spared, as the New York Times reported that the social media company lost 12% of its followers with its CEO Jack Dorsey shedding off 230,000 followers.
