Twitter and Africa’s ‘War on Terror’: News Framing and Convergence in Kenya’s Operation Linda Nchi.1

Abstract

Before the close of 2011, Kenya launched its own local version of a ‘war on terror’ following persistent border incursions by the al-Qaida affiliated al-Shabaab militant group. In a conflict that was seen by many to be fought largely through modern military hardware, the emergence and effective use of social media as yet another site of this warfare reflected the growing influence of new media in mobilizing, debating and circulating issues of public interest. Specifically, this chapter reveals the particular frames that were used in Twitter to keep members of the public informed on the front line developments of the Operation Linda Nchi. Secondly, the study also investigates how the entrance of al-Shabaab into Twitter shaped the media framing of a war previously dominated by the more ‘legitimate’ Kenya Defence Force Twitter account. Finally, in a situation where the Twitter discourse was perceived and defined by the KDF as the official account of the war, this paper shows how the new and the old media converged in news reports in Kenya’s main newspapers and the resultant frames from this convergence.