Back to Africa Check

Ignore scam Facebook page impersonating governor of Kenya’s Uasin Gishu county

IN SHORT: A Facebook page using county governor Jonathan Bii Chelilim’s name offers low interest loans and free motorcycles. Don’t fall for it.

A Facebook account with the name of Uasin Gishu county governor Jonathan Bii Chelilim is offering quick low-interest loans to Kenyans.

Uasin Gishu in western Kenya is about 300 kilometres from the capital of Nairobi.

One of the account’s posts reads: “Congratulations Congratulations to all those Kenyans who have received our INUA JAMII CAPITAL LOANS today we are still offering loans, you can easily get a quick mpesa loan from as low as ksh 5,000-350,000 approved successful within 7 minutes with a low interest rate of 0.5% …”

Inua Jamii is Kenya’s government safety net aimed at helping poor and vulnerable people.

M-Pesa is a popular mobile money service offered by Safaricom, the country’s largest telecoms firm.

The post tells users to “kindly DM or Whatsapp our loan trustee agent” and gives a phone number.

Other posts claim that the account has given new motorbikes to 20 Kenyans.

But is governor Bii really offering cheap loans and freebies?

Chelilim_Scam

Phishing scam

The account’s misspelling of the governor’s name – “Hon Johnathan Bii” – is a red flag. 

Another is that it asks users to provide their personal details such as phone and national ID card numbers. 

This is an attempt at phishing – stealing people’s valuable personal information. Scammers can then use this information to take control of bank accounts and more.

We could not find any of the imposter account’s posts on the politician’s official Facebook page – “Governor Jonathan Bii Chelilim” – which has 55,000 followers.

The first post on the “Hon Johnathan Bii”' account appears to have been on 12 August 2022. The governor's official page has been active since 2 May 2019.

The authentic page shows the daily engagements of the governor. There is no mention of any loans or free motorbikes.

For more help identifying fraudsters on social media, read our guide to Facebook scams and how to spot them.

Republish our content for free

Please complete this form to receive the HTML sharing code.

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 guide

Africa 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

Restricted HTML

  • Allowed HTML tags: <a href hreflang> <em> <strong> <cite> <blockquote cite> <code> <ul type> <ol start type> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd> <h2 id> <h3 id> <h4 id> <h5 id> <h6 id>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
  • Web page addresses and email addresses turn into links automatically.
limit: 600 characters

Want to keep reading our fact-checks?

We will never charge you for verified, reliable information. Help us keep it that way by supporting our work.

Become a newsletter subscriber

Support independent fact-checking in Africa.