EU EOM’S VIEWS

Speaking to Daily Mirror, the Deputy Chief Observer, Dimitra Ioannou and Press Officer, Paul Anderson, of the European Union Election Observation Mission (EU EOM), who arrived in the country to monitor the recently concluded Presidential Elections, stated that the EU EOM continues to follow the posts on social media as a part of its continuing monitoring process.

“In our preliminary statement we view the overall environment in social media during the campaign period, where, for example, we note the negative effect of ‘divisive rhetoric, hate speech and disinformation in traditional and social media as marring a peaceful campaign.’ Hate speech anywhere, inside and outside of elections, is to be condemned,” they said.

Stating that the EU EOM had noted that Facebook hadn’t taken appropriate measures to ensure adherence to campaign silence rules, the EU EOM will submit a final report, which will contain recommendations to improve the electoral process; including in the

sphere of social media. “This is our third observation mission where we have deployed a dedicated social media analyst leading a team of locally recruited analysts,” they revealed.

Commenting on how to prevent such a situation from occurring in the future, Anderson stated that the EU EOM will be hosting a series of round table discussions with key national stakeholders to discuss the best methodology to approach the issue.