TikTok has become a battle place for the struggle since so many Ugandans have signed up for this social network. It’s known that TikTok censors content, but not being on TikTok is not an option.
In December I started to post under my handle @drnico256. Quickly I started to gain followers, but likely also attract Ugandan government operatives ‘reporting’ the videos I posted. On 27 February my account was suspended.
As a result of this, important videos relating to Human Rights abuses in Uganda are no longer available.
93k video exposes Moses Ssimbwa, a fake victim of Human Rights abuses who was paraded by the regime during NRM day in an attempt to downplay human rights abuses reports and discredit the National Unity Platform.
33.7k video is part of a live where Olivia Lutaaya was discussed; a human rights activist / political prisoner who has been on remand for 4 years now.
32.9k video is my first TikTok that went viral and covers a one-man pothole protest in the Netherlands.
39.8k video highlights international hypocrisy when it only mentions Uganda when it comes to their own favorite subjects like Ukraine or Palestine.
17.1k video is a report from a protest held at Dam Square Amsterdam by the National Unity Platform.
Community Guidelines
Community Guidelines are important to keep a platform a safe place. However, Tiktok has allowed these Guidelines to be abused by Ugandan regime operatives to have content removed that exposes the Ugandan dictatorship.
Below I’m lising various excuses that were used to ban my videos
- Hate Speech.
In reaction to a hateful comment, I replied in a friendly way. Twitter does not consider it hateful. It has 3k views. https://twitter.com/klup/status/1761283654532112394
2. Civic and Election Integrity
The video is a screenrecording of a Twitter Space with EC spokesperson Paul Bukenya. It continues to be available on X/Twitter without any issues: https://twitter.com/klup/status/1756448016322453697
3. Nudity and Body exposure
It is understood that TikTok does not want naked body parts. But even after hiding those naked parts, Tiktok hid my video from the ‘For you’ feed, meaning it loses up to 90% of it’s visibility.
Another video that was removed claiming ‘Nudity’ was our submission of Ugandan Human Rights violations to the ICC in The Hague. The bum of Alexandria Marinos is hardly recognizable. Also this removal is an exaggerated application of the Community Guidelines, and the video continues to be available on X.
4. Synthetic and Manipulated Media
This is by far the weirdest warning I got from TikTok: “AI can make it more difficult distinguish between fact and fiction”. The video is a report about a demonstration in Brussels, and images have been added using TikTok’s own Toolkit. No Artificial Intelligence is used to construct this video.
The video is available on X: https://twitter.com/nup_diaspora/status/1761133193598517253
5. Dangerous activities and Challenges / Shocking & Graphic Content
On 27 February a video was widely shared of a Ugandan demonstrator being run over by a government car.
Since TikTok warned me about the original clip that shows the moment of impact, I removed that moment.
TikTok does not apply it’s guidelines consistently, since multiple videos including the moment of impact remain visible on TikTok. Example