Bill Gates conspiracy theories echo through Africa
As the novel coronavirus wreaks multinational havoc, Bill Gates is the new bete noire for conspiracy theorists worldwide including in Africa where a Kenyan politician's false online post has added major fuel to the spread of falsehoods.
While Gates's vaccine programmes on the continent have long provided ample fodder for questions, The bogus claims have gained new grip amid the pandemic.
on the subject of March 15, Nairobi governor Mike Sonko published an old video of Gates warning about decline of a future pandemic, all of the caption "Bill Gates told us in regards to corona virus 2015 (sic),
While the clip shows the philanthropist telling an audience that the world was unprepared for global outbreaks in his TED talk five years ago, He made no reference to the coronavirus.
Sonko's post generated so many relationships among his two million plus Facebook followers that it remains the most prolific global post about Gates in the COVID 19 era, in social media analysis tool CrowdTangle.
to date, It has been shared separate million times and has garnered 38 million views on social media.
The post highlights the role played by local public figures in spreading false or misleading claims around the world, according to the Washington based Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab), Which studies disinformation around the globe.
"They in most cases travel beyond. specific communities when an influencer, including a prominent celebrity, Or even traditional media source, increases them, DFRLab's Zarine Kharazian notified AFP.
"Once they've achieved this measure of spread, They migrate across 'languages',
'All highly potent elites'
Rumours about links between Gates and the current pandemic have enjoyed extremely broad appeal among different conspiracy communities worldwide since the virus erupted in the Chinese city of Wuhan in December 2019.
Since the month of january, upwards of 683,000 posts globally from public Facebook pages and groups known Gates, having nearly 53 million likes, offers and views.
"One commonality of conspiracy theory theories that seems to span borders, dialects, And cultures is a mistrust in 'all powerful elites' and associations, Kharazian asserted.
"Gates's notable profile, Outspokenness and active engagement in international public health work has made him a prime target for this approach strain of conspiracy,
Among reputable claims in Africa is the idea that Gates wants to control mankind with the use of microchip implants or digital tattoos.
Conspiracy theorists have also alleged that Gates stands to profit handsomely from an eventual vaccine and that his foundation patented solution years ago before unleashing the novel coronavirus.
Others again believe he created the virus for population control a sensitive point in Africa where much of the visible push back online has focused on the issue of a COVID 19 vaccine and trial and error trials on
beautiful russian ladies local test subjects.
Past controversies fuel suspicion
a history of Western medical abuses in Africa explains some of the backlash, described Sara Cooper, Senior scientist at the South African scientific research Council's Cochrane Centre.
"during the last few decades, There have been various incidents of medical research conducted in Africa which have involved gross human rights abuses, She commanded AFP.
They range from forced sterilisation studies carried out in Namibia when it was part of Germany's colonies in the late 1800s, To controversial drug trials conducted by Western pharmaceutical giants in various African nations in the 1990s.
The distrust of Western vaccines was evidenced by a recent viral post, Which claimed that French maverick researchers Didier Raoult had warned Africans against using "the check Gates vaccine" since it contained "kill,
AFP Fact Check debunked the claim Raoult never made content and a vaccine does not yet exist.
But it arranged a chord: in france they version of the post was shared more than 47,000 times before it was taken down.
politicians in Nigeria have also pushed similar narratives including Femi Fani Kayode, A former aviation minister notorious for sharing misinformation along political and religious lines.
Fani Kayode, Who has a strong following among christians from southern Nigeria, Has shared multiple posts claiming Gates was part of a secretive power elite, Which wanted to achieve world domination using the coronavirus and 5G technology amongst other things.
WHO brawls back
As the herpes simplex virus numbers and rumours spiralled, Agencies like the World Health institution (which one) Raced to stem the spread of falsehoods by running online campaigns and helping governments to set up dedicated web portals.