Please follow me on twitter,Nyeri County MP Priscilla Nyokabi pleads

Nyeri County MP Priscilla Nyokabi [PHOTO FILE:STANDARD]

By WAINAINA NDUNG’U

A first term MP has appealed for help to make a breakthrough on Twitter.

Nyeri County MP Priscilla Nyokabi says in a Facebook posting that though she is big on Facebook, she has not gained much mileage on twitter and implies that is the reason she is holding her horses before she can graduate to Whats Up.

Ms Nyokabi, a lawyer who cut her teeth at the Kituo Cha Sheria where she had been Executive Director since 2009 until the March 4 elections says in her appeal: “I have very few followers on twitter... Please help...”

One of the youthful parliamentarians at 35, Ms Nyokabi has more than 5,000 Facebook friends and a substantial following. She is popular amongst the youth in her county constituency who refer to her as Nyoks though seen as having greatly benefited from the Jubilee wave in the region to make her parliamentary debut.

She wrote in her post: “Hey, though I joined social media late in May 2012 with lots of persuasion from my friends Jin Ho and Gabby of Netherlands and Angote G, ED of Kituo I have done well with fb however with twitter I am very analogue... Kindly I want to be digital with twitter too before I advance to Whats up... Help me increase the reach in twitter... Please, any advice?”

On her Twitter account where she has 284 followers and follows 277, the MP wrote: “Hey, I have received advice on my fb on how to be a better tweep. I'll follow through as I want to be a digital informative MP. Please help!”

In a later Fb post, Ms Nyokabi wrote: “Hey friends, kindly follow me on twitter - I will follow back. I will also try to tweet more even with the 140 characters challenge for a woman and a lawyer prone to being wordious... I am a bit panicked at being a young MP who is not digital! This time I will give twitter a good shot!”

Compared with equally youthful Nyeri MPs, Ms Nyokabi appears to have an edge on social media. Mathira’s Peter Kinyua Weru, 36, has 3,081 friends and 94 followers on Facebook while 40- year-old Kieni MP Simon Mathenge Kanini Kega has 4,359 friends and 334 followers on the same channel.

Equally youthful Ndung’u  Gethenji of Tetu has 104 followers on twitter and follows 77 compared to 48 followers and six following for Kanini Kega and 1040 followers and eight following for slightly mature Kabando wa Kabando of Mukurwe-ini who is also followed by 5,235 on facebook.