Presidential candidates Battling it out online

NANA AKUFO-ADDO, Ghana’s opposition leader, sits in the Kofi Annan ICT centre in Accra, the capital, to launch his e-campaign for the presidential election in December. Above him a big projector screen depicts him sporting a navy blue suit and a friendly smile, standing behind a map of Ghana overlaid with Facebook, YouTube and Google+ icons. In the top left corner, it reads “Victory 2012” in red letters. With over 120,000 “likes” on Facebook (in a country of 25m), and a solid following on Google+ and Twitter, Mr Akufo-Addo, who heads the New Patriotic Party, is seeking to harness the power of social media—according to the 2010 census, the majority of Ghanaians are under 35 years old and half are urbanised.

“Some of the political parties are beginning to understand that social media could give them a bit of an edge,” says Kwabena Oppong Boateng, a member of “Ghana Decides”, a social media and blogging project which seeks to encourage civic education and facilitate online political debate.

Mr Akufo-Addo posts updates from the campaign trail, uploads YouTube videos and announces rallies and radio appearances. He responds to criticism and talks to his supporters through Google+ Hangouts. He also uses automated phone messages to engage voters, and collects campaign donations via SMS, as President Obama has done in America.

Mr Akufo-Addo’s online presence beats those of most of his rivals. But not that of Papa Kwesi Nduom, an established political figure and leader of the Progressive People’s Party, one of the smaller fledgling parties, who boasts almost 160,000 Facebook likes. Mr Nduom, whom some media outlets are already touting as kingmaker were there to be a runoff, is now dubbed the “Facebook President”. The actual president, John Dramani Mahama, trails far behind with a mere 25,000 likes.

As Africa’s increasingly young and tech-savvy populations are becoming more openly critical of their governments, the role of social media in elections is growing, both as a way of reporting violence and electoral fraud, and of enriching political debate. Ghana Decides was inspired by “Vote or Quench” in Nigeria and “Sunu 2012” in Senegal, which encourage young people to use social media to mobilise protest and foster debate. Ghana, a potential burgeoning African tech-hub, is taking it a step further. The group is teaching people how to register to vote, raising awareness of political issues, and reaching out to civil society organisations, NGOs and political groups to help them get online. Members travel around the country tweeting about issues in rural areas where internet penetration is low or non-existent. They live-tweet press conferences, and moderate online debates.

In Ghana, political debate is limited and acrimonious. Politicians are often given free reign to insult one another over the airwaves and largely set the agenda in newspapers which are partisan or filled with verbatim quotes by leading politicians, or both. The Media Foundation for West Africa is documenting the number of on-air insults issued by politicians and broadcasting the results.

“We don’t want to mimic radio where everyone says whatever they want and they insult one another and its not issues based,” says Kinna Likimani of Ghana Decides. “The insults thing is a political tactic,” to avoid addressing the real issues,” she adds.

With internet penetration in Ghana and most of Africa at only 5-10%, it is not clear how far social media can strengthen and expand African democracy in the short term. But Mrs Likimani says that the debates sparked by social media quickly move offline, and in the long term, Ghana’s online civil society will continue to grow.

-- Kow Essuman, Esq.