How have firms in Africa been dealing with online disinformation thus far? I explore some case studies.
South Africa’s MTN & xenophobia-linked fake news & promotions
Established in 1994, MTN is a mobile telecommunications firm headquartered in Johannesburg, South Africa. It offers voice, data and digital services to over 100 million subscribers in 21 countries across Africa and the Middle East. In early September 2019, MTN had to close its outlets in Nigeria after reprisal attacks on them because of reported xenophobic attacks on Nigerians in its home country, South Africa. When the truth finally emerged, it turned out no Nigerian was killed in the South African attacks, with some of the videos and images purported to be about the incidents turning out to be false. This is an example of how even a politically motivated online disinformation campaign between countries could end up affecting firms with no part in the affair from the outset.
Later, a Facebook page “MTN Awoof” claimed MTN was giving out free data as compensation for the purported xenophobic attacks on foreigners by South Africans. According to Africa Check, which partners with Facebook to curb fake news and false information, this was a false promotion. Africa Check offered some clues as to how it came to that determination. Even as the Facebook page had what looked like the company’s official logo and ordinarily looked genuine, the posts, some of which are highlighted below, used a mix of uppercase and lowercase letters, numbers or special characters in place of letters in some cases, and indicated that customers contact MTN via comments or its inbox on the platform.
“In Order to compensate Africans for the XENOPHOBIA att@chs by South Africans. We are giving out 100GB worth of Data”
“All you have to do is type ‘MTN CARES’ then use the (SEND MESSAGE) button below and send us a message now”
“MTN is giving out 122GB data to Customers for free. All you have to do to qualify is type MTN AWOOF AND SEND US A MESSAGE”
But MTN did not leave it to the fact-checkers alone. And even before the highlighted incident, it already had a culture of informing customers of these fake social media accounts and posts when it happened on them, and would typically get the respective internet platforms have them removed. Furthermore, MTN had been sponsoring training and capacity-building programmes for media practitioners on how to identify and manage fake news. Fake news, bogus social media accounts, and false product announcements remain a recurring problem for MTN.
Collapse of Kenya’s Chase Bank due to social media-fuelled fake news
Defunct Chase Bank, now owned by the Kenyan subsidiary of State Bank of Mauritius, was founded in 1996, with headquarters in Nairobi. In its 2015 financial statements, its last before it was put under receivership by the Central Bank of Kenya in 2016, Chase Bank had total assets of 142 billion shillings, revenue of about 7.5 billion shillings, and more than 1,000 employees. Whatever is left of the hitherto relatively well-regarded bank was taken over by “SBM Kenya” in 2018, after about two years in receivership. How did this state of events come about?
In April 2016, Chase Bank was rumoured via social media to be having financial challenges. While the rumours about the bank’s troubles originally emanated from WhatsApp, it was a tweet by Twitter influencer Mumbi Seraki that proved to be devastating. Seraki tweeted as follows: “After Imperial, CBK focused ON forensic audits and found a similar ALLEGED FRAUD at Chase Bank where close to 15b is missing from the books”. As the timeline of the events that ensued shows, the bank’s communication team did not think much of it. They acted as if everything was normal, issuing a press statement urging the public to instead ignore the rumours.
| Timeline of Chase Bank demise on the back of online disinformation | ||
| Date | Event | Chase Bank Response |
| Sunday, April 3, 2016 | Rumours that Chase Bank was in trouble posted in various WhatsApp groups | Business as usual |
| Tuesday, April 5, 2016 | News on purportedly troubled Chase Bank emerges on Twitter via key online influencer’s account without accompanying proof | Business as usual;
issues press statement |
| Wednesday, April 6, 2016 | Chase bank chairman Zafrullah Khan & CEO Duncan Kabui resign over huge 2015 financial loss & conflicting financial statements | |
| Thursday, April 7, 2016 | Chase Bank put under receivership by Central Bank of Kenya | |
| Source: Nyabola (2019), BBC, The Star | ||
Nyabola (2018) provides a good narration as follows: “The Chase Bank social media accounts were running as normal. Users frantically tagged the bank in Seraki’s [author of original tweet] tweets, urging them to respond. The people managing the bank’s social media urged customers to ignore such rumours: ‘that information is completely false and we urge the public to ignore it’. The bank drafted and issued a press statement asserting that Chase Bank was ‘strong, sound and transparent’.” The steps taken by the bank were clearly not enough to douse the tensions. This is because irate customers, probably feeling unheard as official communication was so slow in coming, took to social media to express their frustration” (Nyabola, 2018). With panic-stricken depositors scrambling to withdraw their funds, the Central Bank of Kenya (CBK) had little choice but to take over the bank two days later. The CBK put the reason for the run on the bank rather succinctly: “Chase Bank Limited experienced liquidity difficulties, following inaccurate social media reports…”.
It is important to point out that there were preceding and concurrent events that made the online rumours more potent than they could have been. Chase Bank had reported a significant financial loss for 2015 just a week before. And in reporting the poor 2015 results, it released two conflicting financial statements, with an audit revealing the bank understated insider loans to staff and directors. Besides, a similarly-sized bank, Imperial Bank, went under only a few months earlier. It was hardly a time for Chase Bank’s communication team to resort to classical tactics.
Edited version of article was first published by Nanyang Business School’s NTU-SBF Centre for African Studies. References available via link viz.
https//nbs.ntu.edu.sg/Research/ResearchCentres/CAS/Publications/Documents/NTU-SBF%20CAS%20ACI%20Vol.%202020-17.pdf
Rafiq Raji
