President William Ruto has given way forward on TikTok even as Members of Parliament debate on its ban.
Speaking during the Kenya Music Festival ‘Winner’ Concert in Nakuru on 23 August, President Ruto said that he will hold a meeting with the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) to find way to regulate content share.
“Tomorrow morning, I will speak to the global CEO of TikTok, I know we have had a conversation as a country over TikTok and some of the challenges in the platform.
We have moderation capacities in other platforms like YouTube and Twitter, tomorrow morning we will have the conversation with the CEO so that we can agree on a mechanism to moderate content in their space to reduce negative content, and leverage on content that benefits people,” the Head of state said.
Furthermore, the President disclosed that he is the one behind the monetization of YouTube and Twitter in Kenya.
“I am happy to say that two of them have agreed to monetize content in Kenya. YouTube for example we are now at 80% monetization.
We are one of the four countries in the African continent that can now monetize our content. Twitter has also agreed to monetize our continent” President Ruto shared.
The President went ahead to share that over the past year, he has been holding discussions with owners of various social media platform from Facebook, Twitter to TikTok including YouTube revealing that they have made progress on the same.
Also Read: Petition to Ban TikTok Sharply Divides MPs
TikTok Ban Debate
President Ruto’s assurance comes at a time when there is an ongoing debate to ban TikTok in Parliament.
According to the petitioner, CEO of Bridget Connect Consultancy, Bob Ndolo, the lawmakers should ban TikTok since it exposes young people to explicit content.
Further, Ndolo argues that even though TikTok has gained popularity in Kenya, the content shared on the platform promotes sexual content, violence, hate speech and offensive language.
Also Read: 5 Popular Kenyans on TikTok and How They Make Money
While commenting on the matter, Leader of Majority Kimani Ichung’wah opposed the banning of TikTok but instead called for regulation.
Further, Ichungwah explained that Kenya cannot fight technology adding that a committee should look at ways to regulate the use of social media apps.
“Many of us, including myself are on TikTok, unashamedly and there’s nothing criminal or evil being on TikTok.” He said.
