Safaricom issues tough guidelines on political messages
Safaricom Chief Executive Officer Bob Collymore. The company has issued tough guidelines in a bid to insulate its network from being used as a platform to spread hate speech in the run-up to the next General Election June 16, 2012. FILE
Safaricom has issued tough guidelines in a bid to insulate its network from being used as a platform to spread hate speech in the run-up to the next General Election.
The new guidelines will require all Content Service Providers (CSP) seeking to communicate political messages to the electorate on behalf of politicians to notify the company in writing at least 48 hours before sending the message.
They will also be required to disclose the sponsoring political party or individual and also furnish Safaricom with the accompanying letters of authorisation.
Safaricom said it will then vet the messages to ensure that among others, they do not contain inciting or discriminatory language that may or is intended to expose an individual or groups to hatred, hostility or ridicule on the basis of ethnicity, tribe, race, colour, religion or gender.
“We are taking an early stand to ensure that our mobile network is not used as a platform to spread hatred or incite the populace to violence through the dissemination of hate-speech via mobile based messaging,” Safaricom Chief Executive Officer, Bob Collymore said in a statement.
The company said that the messages, which will be restricted to Kiswahili and English, should focus on party manifestos and avoiding unnecessary attacks on individual persons, their families, their tribe or their associations.
“After ensuring that the messages are in compliance with the guidelines, we will notify the applicants of our decision within 18 hours of submission of the request.”
The company has further put a cap on the time when such messages may be sent by its affiliated Service Providers.
The guidelines direct that such messages which must bear the name of the political party or individual disseminating the political messages should only be sent during the day, specifically from 8am to 6pm.
Safaricom said it was taking the new measures to play its part in safeguarding against the post election violence that followed the 2007 polls.
The evidence of such consent, the company said must be produced immediately upon request by Safaricom or any other concerned governmental body or regulator.
Other institutions that have crafted such guidelines include the Media Council of Kenya and the Nation Media Group.
Safaricom called on regulatory bodies such as Communications Commission of Kenya (CCK), the National Cohesion and Integration Commission (NCIC), Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) and the Registrar of Political Parties to develop a uniform platform to guide mobile technology based political messages
On Thursday, Deputy Prime Minister Uhuru Kenyatta’s The National Alliance filed a complaint with Safaricom and the police over complaints from the public regarding receipt of unsolicited texts from short codes 3839 and 4885.
TNA's Secretary General Onyango Oloo, revealed that a group calling itself Supreme Candidate Lobby Group has been sending text messages from short code 3839 asking people if they support the DPM for the presidency.
Mr Oloo said that over the past one week the group has been extorting money from members of the public purporting to be associated with the DPM.
On Friday, Safaricom CEO Bob Collymore said that the contract with Datalex was cancelled following an internal investigation which revealed breach of contract.
“This follows internal investigations arising from complaints by The National Alliance party (TNA) that people masquerading as party officials were using the short code to defraud innocent people of their money,” Mr Collymore’s statement said.
