Lawsuit on ‘failure to tackle hate’ to go ahead as judge dismisses tech giant’s claim that it can’t be sued in Kenya
21 May 2025, 10.54am
In October 2021, at the height of the Tigray conflict in Ethiopia, an anonymous Facebook account accused Abrham Meareg’s father of supporting and funding the Tigray rebel forces.
Meareg says these claims were false. But that didn’t stop the mounting death threats on the social media site, some of which were posted publicly and received thousands of likes.
Less than a month later, Meareg’s father was shot dead outside his home as he returned from work. A judge in Kenya has now given his family the go-ahead to sue Meta, Facebook’s parent company, for failing to stop the online abuse and calls for his murder. This is a historic first legal attempt at accountability against Meta in an African court. Before now the company has avoided legal action on the continent on the premise that it is registered abroad and in the U.S. and as such African courts have no jurisdiction over it.
In an exclusive interview with openDemocracy, Meareg has argued Meta treats people in Africa “as mere numbers and a market for exploitation”, promising: “My determination to fight Meta’s arrogance and dismissive attitude of African lives remains strong.”
Meareg and his co-defendant, Fisseha Tekle, another Ethiopian national, blame the tech giant for failing to regulate inflammatory Facebook posts, which they say incited violence in northern Ethiopia during the Tigray conflict, a civil war that raged from November 2020 until a ceasefire was agreed in November 2022.
Meareg says the hateful posts and disinformation shared about his father, Meareg Amare, on Facebook resulted in his murder. Tekle says he was targeted and forced to flee Ethiopia as a result of posts on the site that wrongly said he was related to the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) leaders and called for violence against him.
The two men brought the lawsuit in Kenya as much of Facebook’s content moderation for Africa took place in the country during the Tigray conflict. Meta has since moved its moderation to Ghana and had previously insisted that the two men should not be allowed to bring the lawsuit in Kenya because the court has no jurisdiction there. That argument has now been thwarted by the Kenyan High Court.
Speaking to openDemocracy after the court ruling, Meareg criticised the US tech company for attempting to escape justice for his father’s death, saying it had “weaponised the neocolonial jurisdiction argument” to evade accountability for its actions in Africa.
“It is disgraceful that Meta would argue that they should not be subject to the rule of law in Kenya. African lives matter,” he said. “Mark Zuckerberg may imagine that justice begins and ends at the US border. I am happy that the court has demonstrated today that is not the case.”
Meareg insisted that he would not give up, “no matter how much Meta tries to frustrate us”, adding: “This journey feels like a marathon because the case is unique and hasn’t been tried in Africa before. I’m committed to it because my father’s life mattered. He was devoted to his family and was taken from us in such an unjust way.
“Losing him has been very painful and my determination to fight Meta’s arrogance and dismissive attitude of African lives remains strong. I’m seeking justice for my dad and other families affected by the platform’s lack of safety systems on the continent.”
Meareg’s desire for justice was echoed by Rosa Curling, the co-executive director of the tech justice legal non-profit, Foxglove, which is supporting the lawsuit. “Zuckerberg can pal around with Donald Trump as much as he likes and hope some presidential immunity rubs off, but the courts have reiterated today that Meta is not above African justice,” she said in a statement after it was announced the lawsuit in Kenya would go ahead.
“The facts are clear: Facebook is deadly by design – its algorithm uprates mayhem and violence into its users’ feeds. That is why we’re supporting Abhram and Fisseha in their battle to make the biggest social platform in the world safe for everyone,” Curling added.
Meta is appealing the Kenyan court ruling. The company also faces two other lawsuits in Kenya. It has been accused of forced labour, human trafficking and union busting by South African whistleblower and former Facebook content moderator, Daniel Motaung, while other former content moderators are suing over mass redundancies. The tech giant also responded to both these cases by arguing that Kenyan courts lack the validity to hear them.
How it happened
Meareg Amare was a chemistry professor at Bahir Dar University (BDU) in northern Ethiopia’s Amhara Region in October 2021, when a Facebook account named ‘BDU Staff’ published two posts accusing him of sponsoring war in Wollo, a province in the region, “and providing resources for and financing Tigray forces”.
The posts also claimed that Amare had used his position at the university unlawfully for personal gain – to pay for the construction of his home and to accrue assets and vehicles. They alleged he was an agent of the Woyane rebellion, a resistance group that emerged in 1943 during the previous Tigray uprising against Ethiopia’s former emperor, Haile Selassie.
These accusations were all false, his son Meareg told openDemocracy. But they soon led to calls for his murder being shared on the social media site.
Sixty-year-old Amare was not a Facebook user. It was Meareg, who did have an account, who reported the threats and attempted to get the platform to take them down. His efforts were unsuccessful.
As calls for his murder gained traction, with some of the Facebook posts receiving more than 35,000 likes, Amare maintained his innocence. His loved ones were concerned for his safety, and a friend encouraged him to seek refuge in the country’s capital, Addis Ababa, until things cooled down.
But Amare believed that the community he had been part of for 40 years would vouch for and protect him. He refused to leave and was determined to maintain his usual routine, assuming things would blow over. He was wrong. Soon, his home address and place of work were posted on Facebook and shared widely.
On November 3, 2021, Amare left for work unaware that his home was under surveillance and he was being tailed by his assailants. On his return, he was ambushed and fatally shot outside his home.
His death came just three weeks after the first post calling for his murder.
Facebook claimed it spent over $5bn on safety measures in 2021, according to a 2022 investigation by Time. It said it had contracted more than 15,000 content moderators globally through various third-party outsourcing to protect users and “encourage content reviewers to raise issues when they become aware of them”.
But Amare was not shielded by these resources that Meta says were in place. His son, Meareg, who is based in the US, could not attend his funeral.
Meta is culpable, Mearag insists
Meareg told openDemocracy that he believes his father would have lived to see his 64th birthday in March had Facebook taken down posts calling for his murder. He is not the only one who thinks a loved one was attacked or even killed as a result of hate incited on Facebook during the Tigray conflict.
In a post on 30 August 2021, an account named ‘Northern Patriot Tewodros Kebede Ayo’ accused Qemant, a minority ethnic group in the Amhara region, of aligning itself with the opposition forces and pointing out its Aykel community as “snitches”.
The post said: “The punishment has been imposed… the clean up continues”. Days later, a dozen Qemant residing in Aykel were forced out of their homes and massacred in plain sight.
Staff at Facebook were aware that the account behind the post was said to be part of an online disinformation network affiliated with the Fano militia, according to a November 2021 report by Mail & Guardian.
The South African newspaper cited a leaked internal Facebook document that revealed staff at the tech giant had found the network was orchestrating “calls for violence and other armed conflict in Ethiopia” and “promoting armed conflict, coordinated doxxing, recruiting and fund-raising for the militia”.
In another case, Gebremichael Teweldmedhi, a jeweller from Gonder in the Amhara region, was killed with over 10 other people and buried in a mass grave. His family later told The Bureau of Investigative Journalism: “Online hate campaigns and calls for violence – particularly on Facebook – played a key role in not only his killing, but many others”.
The posts, his family said, identified people and even posted their photos, “inciting attacks, killings and displacements”.
Two members of another family Meareg knows in North Gondar and one of their friends were also killed when a mob descended on their home in September 2021 following calls on Facebook for the elimination of Tigrayans in the area.
The attackers stoned to death the elderly blind woman, her daughter who was battling mental illness and their guest, leaving their bodies out in the open for two days while they hunted the woman’s surviving son. He, too, was eventually captured, but was rescued by unknown individuals before his would-be assailants could kill him. He remains in hiding, fearing for his safety.
Meareg says the deaths of his father and others show why disinformation should not be permitted on social media. As well as seeking $2.4bn from Meta for the victims of hate and violence incited on Facebook, Meareg wants a public apology from the company and a prompt fixing of their social media algorithms in Africa to protect lives.
“Our lives were turned upside down overnight and Meta is responsible for it,” he said.
openDemocracy reached out to Meta for comment but did not receive a response as of publication time.