President William Ruto has announced engaging with Tiktok Global Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Shou Zi Chew on the moderation of content in Kenya.

Speaking during the Kenya Music Festival Winners’ State concert in Nakuru, Ruto noted the need to commercialize growing talents through digitization.

“Tomorrow morning I will be speaking to the Global CEO of Tiktok so that we can agree on a mechanism to moderate content in their space to reduce negative contents and leverage on monetization that benefits more people,” he said.

He also revealed that he will ensure that his government works closely with the ministries of Education and Sports to ensure that every talent in Kenya does not go unnoticed.

“We are one of the four countries in Africa that can now monetize our content. We are now at 80 per cent monetization. Kenya Institute of Curriculum Development (KICD) should have a You tube channel where we can sell the contents of our children displayed here,” he said.

Scholarships for the top-performing and certified pupils have been guaranteed, and teachers who assisted in performing the musical performances will receive promotions in their various fields of employment.

The president also mentioned that a creative bill is being worked on to ensure that the creative docket has professional studios in every county to give opportunities to every talent in Kenya and that the Permanent Presidential Commission (PPC) in charge of statehouse music performance will be changed to Creative Commission of Kenya.

This comes amid a petition tabled in the National Assembly seeking to ban TikTok by Bob Ndolo, an executive officer of the Briget Connect Consultancy, citing that Tiktok has explicit content and lack of privacy, among others.