Social media playing key role
Footage of abuses published on Facebook, politicians tweeting their every move: for the first time, the West African state of Cameroon is heading into a presidential election in which social media is taking a central role. Nine candidates are contesting the October 7 poll, including President Paul Biya, who has ruled the country for 35 years and is hoping to be re-elected for a sixth time. But this time, the 85-year-old broke with media tradition by announcing his candidacy on Twitter. During the last election in 2011, only a handful of candidates were using social media. Today, almost all of them have a dedicated team to ensure they are very much present online.
One of Biya’s main challengers is Joshua Osih — head of the opposition Social Democratic Front (SDF) — who has taken to engaging with voters online.
When he came under fire for “unpresidential behaviour” after posting a picture of himself at the airport in Paris, he hit back immediately on Twitter, saying that was exactly the point.
“I want to break with protocol and everything to do with the myth around the presidency,” he wrote. “I want to be close to the people I rule and not shut up in a palace.” For candidates, going online offers far greater exposure than traditional forms of campaigning, explains Julie Owono, executive director of Internet Without Borders, an NGO. “There is much greater potential in terms of reach than when their words are communicated through the written press or the radio,” she said.
For Owono, this increased presence online is the result of a significantly higher rate of Internet connectivity in Cameroon.
Figures released earlier this month by the ministry of postal and telecom services show connectivity jumped from a mere 0.24 per cent of the population in 2011 to 35 per cent last year.
“There has been a fall in the cost of Internet access and network quality has also improved,” she said.
Although the official launch of the election campaign is only due to start on Saturday, social media is already highlighting prominent topics, especially the security crisis in Cameroon’s English-speaking regions.
Blighted by armed conflict, the two regions have remained largely inaccessible to the media and NGOS but those involved in the fighting have used social media to expose purported human rights violations by the other side.