S. Sudan disowns president Kiir’s social media accounts

March 9, 2015 (JUBA) – All social media accounts created in South Sudan president, Salva Kiir’s name are fake and should be disregarded, a spokesperson for the presidency said Monday.

Ateny Wek Ateny said the twitter and facebook accounts that exist in Kiir’s name were not genuine and should be ignored.

For instance, a twitter account created a year ago in the name of Salva Kiir Mayardit currently has more than 27,000 followers.

“And every time the president is travelling abroad, a lot of misleading information is posted into these facebook and twitter accounts in an attempt to confuse the world about his well-intended quest for peace,” said Ateny.

“The office of the president would like to inform the general public that president Salva Kiir Mayardit has neither a facebook nor twitter account in his name or nickname,” he added.

According to Ateny, not even the president’s office trends on social media.

“If any, individual staffs in the office of the president may have had facebook or twitter account for their personal use, which does not represent the office of the president in anyway”, he stressed.

The presidential aide said it was a criminal act punishable by law for the public to use president Kiir’s picture for their personal motives and that technology experts from the president’s office are searching for individuals operating these social media accounts.

A “verified” twitter account reportedly has a white check mark in a blue cloud on a user’s profile. However, twitter does not accept verification requests from the general public, and the selection process for getting verified is said to be completely opaque.

(ST)