This tweet published on October 17, 2021 suggests that the former Machakos First Lady Lillian Ng’ang’a intends to vie for Nairobi County’s Women Representative seat in the coming 2022 general elections.
Background
Momentum for Kenya’s 2022 general elections is fast-rising, with 12 people having already declared their intention to run for president. The Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) on October 4 launched the voter registration process, which is set to run until November 2, 2021.
Misinformation around the 2022 elections has equally been rife, with claims including a fake TIFA poll that showed Julius Bitok as the leading gubernatorial candidate for Uasin Gishu county as debunked by Piga Firimbi here, a doctored video claiming that a crowd gathered at Raila Odinga’s rally in Laikipia County heckled him by chanting political rival William Ruto’s name as fact-checked here and another claim that showed a fake blueprint of Deputy President William Ruto’s Bottom-Up economic approach.
Verification
The tweet that appears to have come from the former Machakos First Lady has gained traction with over 150 retweets, more than 2,000 likes as well as republications containing the same information.
However, Piga Firimbi found that this tweet is not from Lillian’s official Twitter handle.
The imposter account replicates her main account, using the same profile photo. Nonetheless, the bio on this account states that it is a parody account (see screengrab below).
Lillian’s official Twitter account does not contain any post declaring her interest to vie for the Nairobi Women Representative seat. See a screengrab of her official account below.
Further debunking this claim, is that there is no credible media source that has reported the former Machakos first lady’s intention to run for the Nairobi Women Representative seat in 2022.
Verdict
FALSE, the tweet claiming to show Lillian Ng’ang’a declaring that she will be vying for the Nairobi Women Representative seat is fabricated.
This story was produced by Africa Uncensored in partnership with Code for Africa with support from Deutsche Welle Akademie.
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