Wasn’t me: CS Wandayi denies involvement in AI campaign praising him

Energy and Petroleum Cabinet Secretary Opiyo Wandayi has distanced himself and the Ministry from claims that an artificial intelligence-driven social media campaign was used to manufacture public support for his work on electricity tariffs.

Mr Wandayi on Saturday said his attention had been drawn to what he described as “unverified reports” alleging the manufacture of social media activity purportedly praising actions taken by the Ministry of Energy and Petroleum on electricity tariffs.

He said the reports had not identified the particular actor or author behind the alleged campaign, arguing that millions of anonymous and coordinated accounts push different political and commercial narratives on social media every day.

“What matters is evidence,” Mr Wandayi said.

“There are probably millions of anonymous and coordinated accounts on social media pushing different narratives every day. What matters is evidence. The said reports have not actually established that either the Cabinet Secretary or the Ministry authorised, directed, or otherwise participated in the creation of the alleged activity.”

His response comes after US technology company Anthropic said it had identified and disrupted what it described as a domestic Kenyan political astroturfing operation that used Claude, its artificial intelligence model, to generate coordinated political content designed to appear as spontaneous grassroots opinion.

According to Anthropic, the actor generated batches of exactly 50 tweets and instructed Claude to make them look like organic grassroots commentary. A large portion of the content praised Mr Wandayi over the stopping of a scheduled Kenya Power electricity tariff hike, using the hashtags #PowerReliefKE and #PoweringTheNewKenya.

The same operation also pushed claims that the United Opposition was breaking apart ahead of the 2027 General Election, targeting former Deputy President Rigathi Gachagua and former President Uhuru Kenyatta.

Anthropic, however, did not accuse Mr Wandayi or the government of commissioning the campaign.

The company said it found no evidence of government involvement, did not identify the exact organisation responsible and classified the operation as Category One because it remained within a network of fake accounts and failed to reach or influence real people.

Anthropic said the operation used one playbook to push both pro-government and anti-opposition narratives, describing the combination as consistent with a coordinated electoral communications effort.

It also found that the same AI workflow was being used for marketing Kenyan retail brands, suggesting that techniques used for commercial influence could be repurposed for political campaigns.

The Cabinet Secretary also turned his response towards the opposition, saying the government was focused on implementing its development agenda rather than engaging in what he described as social media propaganda.

“And to the so-called united opposition, get to know that we are focused on implementing the Government’s transformative development agenda across the country,” Mr Wandayi said. “As such, we have no time to engage with you on unhelpful social media propaganda.”

He challenged the opposition to confront the government on the ground.

“The place to find us is on the ground; let us meet there,” he said.

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