Social media and Nigeria’s elections Nigeria’s political space is super charged. Political gladiators are having one of the toughest tests of their careers. In a country of 174,507,539 people, it takes more than happenstance to emerge as president or become one of the 109 senators or 360 members of House of Representatives that will be representing the country when the National Assembly resumes in May, 2015. The competition is also no less keen at the state level. The election is shaping up gradually with the primaries from the two major political parties in the country already underway or over for some offices. Nigeria’s social media space has also been clearly divided along various lines – the partisan, the non-partisan, the indifferent, the super-critics, social change agents and cyber rodents all have their space in the ecosystem. The 2011 elections helped to sight what was possible through the use of social media for civic engagement. The 2015 election will even be more defining for a number of apparent reasons. The population of social media users and enthusiasts in the country has grown. In February 2012, the National Bureau of Statistics released information that over 95 per cent of Nigerians lacked access to the Internet. The International Telecommunication Union, early in the same year, told the world that Nigeria was home to 45 million Internet users. Mobile subscription in the country around the same time was put at over a 100 million mobile phones. Enter 2014 and the jump has been remarkable, a clear pointer that more civic engagement will be possible ahead of and during the 2015 elections. Nigeria today, according to statistics from the Nigerian Communications Commission has about 134 million mobile phone lines and Internet user figure is marching boldly to about 70 million. The capacity of new media technological tools to aid several phases of the election process especially voters’ participation is not lost on Nigeria’s Independent National Electoral Commission. In the run up to the election thus far, it has made informed discussion possible. INEC’s Twitter handle – @inecnigeria currently has a following of over 142,000. Prior to the 2011 election, the account was unverified by Twitter but it now carries a verified status. INEC is not the only one who thinks social media will be part of what will shape the 2015 elections. It is premised on this that the Democratic Governance for Development (DGD) II project (a joint donor-funded project managed by UNDP in support of deepening democracy in Nigeria) put together a Social Media Retreat in Uyo last week. The two-day retreat which had in attendance representatives of government agencies, leading international and national ICT experts, media groups, civil society and youth groups succeeded in reviewing the emerging opportunities and lessons learnt in the social media landscape and how these will assist the 2015 general elections. Several new media innovations already in the pipeline ahead of the elections were also shared. INEC at the meeting showed it had further embraced enhanced features on its website as Nigerians can now check their voter registration status online. Logging on the page and keying into one’s state of registration, last name and Voter Identification Number last five digits will provide clear answers for intending voters. To cater for non-smart phone users, it is also possible to have such information by sending SMS with one’s state, last name and Voter Identification Number (VIN) to 08171646879. WangoNet also got its 9jaVoter app reviewed by the audience. The app is designed to fully engage with young voters especially using its knowledge base and also reward their engagement through a free recharge card win. The app was reviewed in the reality of other possible challenges. A group, Enough is Enough also shared information about its ReVoDa app which allows voters become citizen observers from their polling unit with their mobile numbers already mapped. shineyoureyes.org also attested to the possibility of engaging with elected officials. It represents a decent tool for engagement in the pre and post electoral cycle. The National Orientation Agency has also continued to explore the use of social media to shore up citizen participation in the electoral process in addition to face-to-face engagement. The International Press Centre made public a media engagement website ahead of the election is designed for journalists and other citizens interested in press resources around the election and seeking a platform to push out genuine news and information that some traditional media may not approve of. Youth Initiative for Advocacy, Growth & Advancement unveiled to the array of social media experts at the meeting. Amplified Radio is an online radio with contents to raise public awareness around governance issues is also putting together a social media kit/guide for effective citizen participation during the election. Microsoft and Google were present in the room. While the former pitched its algorithm and capacity for prediction of election scenarios, Google championed its yet to be publicly unveiled platform for the Nigerian election. Both clearly requested for plug-in points into their projects from civil society actors in the room. CCHub was hoping to help add technological flavour to programmes around elections that any non-governmental organisation was engaged in. International examples in using social media for elections were also drawn from Umati in Kenya, Facebook on Election Day 2010 in the United States and iVote in India amongst others. The possibilities seem endless with social media and the post-2015 election social media review is certainly one new media enthusiasts will look forward to.
Posted on: Tue, 09 Dec 2014 08:56:00 +0000
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