Everyone has their own technique for protesting against the pension reform. If some take to the streets, others launch challenges on social networks. This is the case of a Twitter user, who operates under the pseudonym “Mlz13”. “If this tweet reaches 50 likes, I send 27k fake subscribers to Borne so that it has exactly 49.3k subscribers,” he posted on Sunday March 19.
You guessed it, the idea was to increase the number of subscribers on the Instagram account of the Prime Minister, Elisabeth Borne, to “49,300”, in reference to 49.3, an article of the Constitution, which makes it possible to pass a bill without a vote. On March 16, the government chose to use it to pass its pension reform. But the forced passage of this highly contested piece of legislation has been widely criticized.
Explosion of counters
And it didn’t take long for Internet users to get caught up in the “Mlz13” game. His tweet quickly exceeded the expected “50 likes”. This Wednesday morning, it even has more than 38,000. The twittos reached its goal four hours after its first tweet. In a second post, he congratulated Elisabeth Borne for her 49,300 subscribers, accompanying her with a screenshot as proof.
The reaction of the Prime Minister – and no doubt of her communication teams – was not long in coming. His Instagram account was deactivated briefly around 10 p.m., photojournalist Louis Witter reported on Twitter. Elisabeth Borne’s account was reactivated a few minutes later, posting 49,200 subscribers, before crossing the bar of 49,300 subscribers, according to the screenshots of our colleague.
Finally, the account of the head of government was passed in private. In other words, this means that new subscribers must be approved one by one by the account holder. And according to Louis Witter, it’s a titanic job for the communication team which probably has to take care of it: “We go to 49.1K subscribers, that means that the Matignon communication team is in the process of turning, by hand , hundreds of subscribers.
Soon new victims?
This little challenge has obviously pleased users. On Twitter, some even asked “Mlz13” to do the same with other political figures. “You’re asking me to send fake subs to too many people. I will open a paypal if this continues,” he wrote. “I’m keen to send 20 balls to do the same to [Oliver] dussop and Mrs the president of the AN [Yaël Braun-Pivet] huh, “suggested a user. “You are a genius, should do that with all the ministers,” added another.
No sooner said than done. His second victim is none other than Olivier Dussopt, the Minister of Labor – a new signal against pension reform. For “100 likes”, the twittos promised to increase the number of subscribers of the minister to 49,300. Again, it didn’t take long to surpass that figure. Less than two hours later, it was done. This Wednesday morning, the tweet totaled 15,700 likes.
But how did “Mlz13” do it? If it is forbidden in theory to buy followers on Instagram, in practice, many sites allow it to be done. A few hours after his first tweet on Elisabeth Borne, “Mlz13” published a new post showing the purchase of 37,000 subscribers on behalf of the Prime Minister, who then had 12,300 subscribers at that time.
But the little joke is not really to the taste of the Prime Minister and her teams, who denounced “a raid with a lot of false accounts” and “a desire for disinformation behind this malicious act”, according to our colleagues from Parisian.