Social media will play critical role in 2015 elections, says minister

Omobola Johnson, minister of communications technology, says social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, amongst others, are sure to play critical roles in the forthcoming 2015 general elections.

Johnson, who presented the ministry’s scorecard since creation, at the ongoing Ministerial Platform in Abuja, was responding to a question by a member of the audience who sought to know if the Federal Government would control social media.

From all indications, the Nigerian government is not looking at that direction. A new national survey by the Pew Research Centre further reinforces government’s position. According to the research report, mobile phones and social media platforms are playing an increasingly prominent role in how voters across the globe acquire political information and follow election news and happenings.

Johnson said that in view of this, the President Goodluck Jonathan’s administration recognised the importance of social media as a viable platform of engagement between the government and citizens.

“This government does not believe in controlling the social media. So we won’t control the use of social media come 2015 elections but we will be managing them.
“They are going to be playing a very important part in the coming elections.

“I think what we are trying to do is manage the social media because government also has a social media platform of their own.

“If you take a look at our websites, you will see that we have our Twitter and Facebook links, so we are engaging in social media as well. So it will play a very important role in the 2015 polls’’ said Johnson.

She added that “we have millions of Nigerians connected to the social media platform and over 80 percent of them will be participating in the coming elections. So it is very important to engage in social media platforms, it is not about controlling them but about using them as positive tools to have successful elections come 2015”, Johnson further added.

She also disclosed that the ICT industry contributes about $50 billion to GDP (Gross Domestic Product). Nigeria’s GDP is about $500 billion and information communications technology (ICTs) contributes about 10 percent to Nigeria’s GDP.