Citizen TV To Pay For Elon Musk's Twitter Blue Verification

Citizen TV under the Royal Media Services (RMS) will pay to restore its verification status on Twitter after its legacy blue tick was taken away in a mass purge on Thursday, April 20, Viral Tea can confirm.

A source based at the Kilimani-based media house which hosts the country's largest TV station explained on Friday, April 21 that the media house had taken into consideration finances to cater for the monthly subscription, and given its status as an organization, it would have to pay Ksh131,300 per month for its yellow checkmark.

This also includes another Ksh6,570 per month for affiliated accounts like customer care or employees' accounts, and in RMS's case, it would have to cater for its three TV stations and 14 radio stations, 12 of which are vernacular to cater to the diverse cultures in the region and a Video on Demands platform (Viusasa).

In comparison, an individual account is charged Ksh1,419 every month or Ksh14,830 every year to get the blue tick.

"We will pay for the verification," the source told Viral Tea.

The decision came after a number of parody accounts using the Citizen Digital logo as its profile picture emerged at the same time and confused loyal users from its main account, which has over 5.2 million followers.

The accounts, under the TV station's credentials, began spreading all manner of fake news, including one that purportedly announced the death of its chairman, SK Macharia, and a number of purported court cases among others which were all flagged down as fake news.

"Stay updated and debunk fake news by following our official Citizen TV Twitter account," the TV station responded.

The station was among nearly all Kenyan media houses which had their legacy blue ticks deleted en masse after Musk honoured his threat of revoking legacy blue checkmarks from accounts that had them on the platform, which means users who have been having the blue tick for free will have to pay per month to keep their status.

After initially pushing the date of the mass purge from Saturday, April 1, the social media giant began deleting all legacy blue checkmarks, with users crying foul of losing their verification status which was only reserved for journalists, celebrities and politicians among others.

NTV was one of the media houses that retained its blue checkmark, with its status reading "This account is verified because they are subscribed to Twitter Blue and verified their phone number." In comparison, Daily Nation, Nation Breaking News and Nairobi News all lost their blue checkmarks.

It is worth it to note that both Daily Nation and NTV, as well as Nairobi News, are owned by the Nation Media Group (NMG), thus raising the question of why the media house did not consider in advance to pay for the media channels' accounts to retain their verified status, which NMG's corporate Twitter account has also retained.

Musk's ruthless purge of legacy blue ticks also affected government Twitter accounts such as the Ministries of Interior and Health, among others as well as the Directorate of Criminal Investigations (DCI) with over 1.4 million followers, the Kenya Airports Authority (KAA) and Kenya Power. In the private sector, Safaricom lost its verification on its customer care page with 1.6 million followers.

The purge also affected thousands of prominent journalists including CNN news anchor Larry Madowo and a number of Citizen TV journalists such as Waihiga Mwaura, with the former previously declaring that he would not pay to keep his badge.

"My 'legacy verified' checkmark is gone. Still not paying. This was fun," Madowo tweeted moments after losing his blue badge.

"Can’t pay, won’t pay for Twitter blue! Verification lost its meaning if anyone can get it!" sports journalist Eric Njiru defiantly tweeted.

Madowo had previously highlighted the risk of identity theft and other malicious activities that could arise if anyone could create an account in his name and get it verified at a fee

"I have no plans to pay for Twitter Blue at this time, and neither does CNN. Twitter says my blue checkmark will soon disappear after 12 years of being verified.

An image of gold checkmarks on Twitter accounts. /TWITTER

"Anyone will be able to create an account in my name and get it verified for $8. What could possibly go wrong?" Madowo tweeted.

Twitter user Sylvia Ndunge opined that the presence of an increased number of blue ticks on user profiles could increase misinformation spread across the platform, her view which was covered extensively by Viral Tea.

Read Also: How Several Kenyans With Twitter Blue Ticks Could Spread Fake News