Zuma joins the Twittersphere
CLAD in a colourful faux-madiba shirt, former president Jacob Zuma has taken to Twitter in a bid for social media street cred.
While many social media users made fun of his stilted 45-second video introduction to Twitter yesterday, it seems to have worked, racking up more than 188 000 views and his @Presjgzuma account garnering more than 40 000 followers.
Zuma is yet to follow anyone on the platform, not even the ANC.
The reason for his sudden appearance on Twitter?
“I’ve decided to move with (the) times to join this important area of conversation,” he said in his video, claiming that there were many people talking about him, and others trying to impersonate him, and he wanted to join the conversation.
The video is shot with Zuma sitting in front of a grand piano and what appears to be a framed academic degree.
Just in case viewers didn’t realise who was speaking, he ended with: “It’s me, former president Jacob Zuma.”
A short while later, he retweeted one of these alleged impersonators, who was claiming to be raising money for Zuma.
“Fund-raising for ubaba, it goes direct, no middle man. SA is a giving Nation, let’s say thank you MSHOLOZI!!” said Muke25700481.
Zuma’s response: “This is false.” In the hours since he became active on the account, “ubaba” began trending on local Twitter, with almost 5 000 tweets liked in the late afternoon.
But the trolls came out in full force, with jokes, memes and sarcastic “praise” aimed at the former president, who remains under investigation for his alleged role in state capture.
“Can’t wait for ubaba to start sliding into them DMS like he did into the bank accounts of State Owned Enterprises,” tweeted @Pol_sec_analyst.
“You’re kindly requested to post more pictures of yourself. They make good memes,” said user Ms Gupta.
“Welcome to Black Twitter Tata, take a seat, fasten your seatbelt & get ready for the ride,” said @Bavenmutandwa.
“Record a voice note and say this amount, R12 500 348,07, so we know it’s really you,” wrote @Prince_ma7.
Loyal Zuma-ists began showing their support for the former president, claiming he was missed outside of his appearances at his criminal cases.