While political parties are mostly keenly aware of the power of social media, for now they do not regard it as a key channel for attracting new voters.<\/p>\n
This is the view of internet and technology analyst, Arthur Goldstuck, MD of World Wide Worx.<\/p>\n
According to Goldstuck, the political parties are not using social channels to convince voters to change their minds.<\/p>\n
“The Facebook and Twitter presence of most parties and their leaders is geared to reinforcing their message to their supporters, rather than converting other parties’ supporters,” the industry analyst said.<\/p>\n
He said it would have a tremendous influence in countries where political parties are not deeply entrenched among voters, or where a high proportion of voters is “married” to the party as an almost religious affiliation.<\/p>\n
“The result is that, in countries with fluid voting dynamics, social networks can sway the election result. In South Africa, there is very little likelihood of this happening,” Goldstuck said.<\/p>\n
According to the BBC<\/a>, India’s political parties have been using social media as a battleground to attract voters for the country’s nationwide parliamentary elections, which began in April, and are scheduled to conclude a week (12 May) after the elections in South Africa (7 May).<\/p>\n The British news site said that, during the general election in 2009, social media usage in India was negligible.<\/p>\n However, Facebook has 93 million users in India, while Twitter has an estimated 33 million accounts in that country.<\/p>\n “The critical mass of voters in social media is the main reason these channels are taken so seriously in India,” Goldstuck said.<\/p>\n “In South Africa, we can expect that kind of intensified focus on social media in the 2019 elections, when we can expect more than 20-million South Africans to be online. With more than half of the voting population using the Internet and social media by then, it will probably as important a campaign channel as radio and TV,” Goldstuck said of South Africa.<\/p>\n “The social media efforts being made during the 2014 elections are in reality a dress rehearsal for 2019, when it will make a real difference,” he said.<\/p>\n As a matter of reference, the ANC, South Africa’s ruling party’s Twitter page\u00a0 (@MyANC_ ) Rival party, the Democratic Alliance (@DA_News) has 77,300 followers, having tweeted 26,900 times, but is also following 26,100 accounts.<\/p>\n Commander in chief of Economic Freedom Fighters [EFF], Julius Malema (@Julius_S_Malema) has 447,000 followers, with 6,600 tweets, following 169 accounts.<\/p>\n On Facebook, the EFF has 83,900 likes, the DA has 97,500 likes, and the ANC has 28,600 likes, whilst another account, MyAnc, has 141,000 likes.<\/p>\n Active Facebook users in SA range between 9.6 million and 11 million at the end of 2013, while Twitter users in the country is estimated at 5.5 million.<\/p>\n
\ncommands in excess of 120,000 followers, having tweeted more than 11,100 times, whilst following 6,570 accounts.<\/p>\nMore on social media and elections<\/h3>\n