IN SHORT: Three Facebook accounts using the name of Kenyan actor Mwanasha Johari are offering generous cash giveaways. But they are impersonating the actor and should be ignored.
Three Facebook accounts – Sultana Citizen, Sultana Citizen Gifts and Sultana Citizen – are running promotions on Facebook groups in Kenya.
All three appear to ride on the popularity of Mwanasha Johari, a Kenyan actor who played the main character on Citizen TV’s Sultana.
Perhaps to entice users, each of the accounts feature photos of famous personalities in Kenya, including local actors and news anchors.
The posts by the accounts offer users up to KSh55,000 (US$370) for answering simple questions posted on Facebook groups with thousands of members.
They have posted the offers here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here.
But are the Facebook pages and their offers legit? We checked.
Signs of a scam
The posts are poorly written, with random capitalisation and odd punctuation. This is the first sign that the offers are a scam and are not from legitimate accounts.
It is also unlikely that the actor would give away such large sums of money to so many people for such simple tasks on social media. This is too good to be true – usually a sure sign that something on social media is not to be trusted.
The posts are also uncharacteristic of a celebrity. Most use their pages and accounts to interact with their fans, post their photos and promote products. But the three accounts have little to show of the actor.
We noted that two of the accounts include the same WhatsApp number, which means they are likely operated by the same person. We sent a message to that number to ask about the promotions and were told to pay KSh699 in order to win.
We messaged the other number too and were asked to pay KSh486 to “unlock” the reward. These are clear signs of a scam.
We checked Johari’s verified Instagram account, which has over 88,000 followers, and found no offers like the ones on the suspicious Facebook accounts. She has only posted photos and details about the TV show she used to appear in.
The three Facebook accounts should be ignored.
Republish our content for free
For publishers: what to do if your post is rated false
A fact-checker has rated your Facebook or Instagram post as “false”, “altered”, “partly false” or “missing context”. This could have serious consequences. What do you do?
Click on our guide for the steps you should follow.
Publishers guideAfrica Check teams up with Facebook
Africa Check is a partner in Meta's third-party fact-checking programme to help stop the spread of false information on social media.
The content we rate as “false” will be downgraded on Facebook and Instagram. This means fewer people will see it.
You can also help identify false information on Facebook. This guide explains how.
Add new comment