Al Shabaab vs Kenya: The Twitter war

A great irony of the cyber age is the way it connects seemingly incongruous and anachronistic opposites in bizarre and unexpected ways. Now the ragtag though powerful Islamist terror group, Al Shabaab, is taking on the Kenyan army on the battlefields of... Twitter.

By Simon Allison

15 Dec 2011

"We shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills, we shall fight in the Twittersphere." This is a quote from a speech that Winston Churchill never made, but, had he been fighting his wars in the 21st century, he might have. For Twitter is becoming another place for enemy combatants to do battle, although their weapons in this particular battleground are limited to social currency and 140 characters.

Al Shabaab, the Islamic militant group currently fighting a guerrilla war against Kenyan troops in Somalia, is the latest to take its conflict to the social media. Its opponent, Kenya, invaded Somalia to try to wipe out Al Shabaab, was already there, in the form of Kenyan Defence Force (KDF) spokesman Emmanuel Chirchir (@MajorEChirchir) who has swiftly developed a following of more than 10 000, most of whom are charmed by his unabashed jingoism ("Be assured that all Kenyan troops are in good spirits and Steadfast to Mission at Hand") and his donkey paranoia ("selling donkeys to Al Shabaab will undermine our efforts in Somalia", he said once, threatening to bomb large groups of donkeys).

Continue reading the full story on www.freeafricanmedia.com.

About the author

Simon Allison is a specialist in African and Middle East politics, with degrees from Rhodes university and the School of Oriental and African Studies. He lived in Egypt for four years. He also co-authors the politics blog Third World Goes Forth.