Thursday, March 21st will
be a day to remember. No, there was no earthquake, no Tsunami and no
extraordinary bomb blast in the "bomb nations" part of the
world. But there was huge violence. No, not just violence, it was
war. The kind of war that strikes you with a boom. First because you
never saw it coming, and second, by the time you realized what is
happening.. things have really gone bad. Very bad.
It happened on Twitter.
It happened on Twitter.
The background is the
reported « not so nice » welcome and hospitality that the
Kenyan Soccer team received in Nigeria, in preparation for a match.
News got back to Kenya and Kenyans on Twitter (KOT) decide to give
Nigerians a piece of their KOT mind. And there was a return from
Nigerians on Twitter (NOT). There was fire for fire.. The war is
still on, and may not subside any time soon.
The Good
Can anything good come out
of a war ? This time, I will answer "Yes, Social Media
has made it possible".
For one thing, both
countries were Twitter Trending Topics almost the whole day. It will
be good to see the exact number that the tweets that had
#SomeoneTellNigeria, #SomeoneTellKenya, #SomeoneTellNigerians and
#SomeonetellKenyans or their close likes actually generated on
Twitter. Some tweets received retweets in the thousands.
The other good thing is
that for once, we can have a different kind of war. This digital or
social media war has gone on with an arsenal made up of computers,
tablets, mobile phones, and Internet connection. Make no mistake,
there is a financial cost to it : hours of data package,
bandwidth, electricity, phone credits and human energy were
expended.
This is the kind of war
for which the Security Council of the African Union will not have to
meet. No Mediator will need to be appointed, no negotiation meetings
will have to hold and no MIS* or UNM* peace-keeping
force will be needed. No world power will have to « take its
responsibilities » and impose itself on the warring countries.
All of that wont happen.
Yes, I was amazed at the
mobilisation. At the speed at which tweets arrived and the intensity
in the posts. Unbelievable !! Kenyans on Twitter, Nigerians on
Twitter !! Irrespective of what they were saying, this was a
clear demonstration of AOT – Africans on Twitter !! We
followed.. from Cape to Cairo, Dakar to Djibouti. Ghanaians and
Tanzanians did not want to miss it. And yes, Global Twittosphere,
Social and tradition media cashed in !!
You know what I really
found « good » ? The possibility that people have
to bring out all the violence in them.. to out it.. without needing
to purchase arms, shoot bullets or launch grenades. The violence was
intense, and I was personally surprised at how much of it is latent
…. seething underneath.. while we do emails that end with « best
regards », post Bible passages, and exchange niceties.. all of
that.. just waiting to explode.
The Bad
Did the people who
launched into the war take time to find out what exactly the problem
was? Did Nigerians and Kenyans get the full story ? Why
will any African engage in trading insults on a sister country?
Do people realise that the "Internet never forgets?
Twitter may have given people the opportunity to out their violent
thoughts, but did they really weigh their tweets ? I got the
impression, in reading some of the tweets, that some just saw the
war, saw in it an opportunity to be a Twitter mercenary and got "Twirecruted". No matter the perspective from which we look
at it, heaping insults on the Internet is a no-no. There may be
boomerangs.
The bad here is that
people are engaging in a war whose every bullet is seen, calculated,
and recorded. These tweets may hunt people later, in ways and places
that they will least expect.
The bad is also that football, instead of being the opportunity for the consolidation of ties, of friendship and of humanity is now being used to fuel violence.
The Ugly
The hate speech. Photos
that should never have been online, characterising human beings as
animals. I was scandalised to see people use skin colour as a
weapon. These tweets, of Africans by Africans will fuel the wheels
of racism. Even in war conditions, there is something called the
International Humanitarian Law, something called crime against
humanity. In this Twitter war, I saw Twitter-genocide, or should I
say Twittercide.
There are criminal minds
out there. There are individuals looking for the slightest
provocation to go a rampage. There are extremists waiting for tweets
like these to instigate physical violence.. Someone somewhere is
looking for a valid reason for a violent retaliation. I have begun to
ask myself if very soon we will not be having Twiterrorism.
Imagine if Nigeria and
Kenya shared borders ?
Quo vadis...
I am asking myself
questions. Is this current (Twitter) generation better than the one
before? What has this generation learned about African Unity?
With all the wars in Africa, have we not lost enough to be wiser?
How come our use of technology, instead of being constructive, is
increasingly becoming destructive; self destructive?
Moving forward
I have taken a line from
the Kenyan, the Nigerian and African Union anthems and this what I
see :
« The Labours of our
heroes past shall never be in vain. Let all with one accord, in
common bond united, dedicate ourselves to rise together to defend
our liberty and unity »
VIVA AFRICA
