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Teke Ngomba PhD Student, IMV, Aarhus University

Signs of ‘Modernity’, Mimicry or Media of Relevance? ICTs and the Changing Phases of Political Campaign Communication in sub-Saharan Africa. Teke Ngomba PhD Student, IMV, Aarhus University. Introduction….

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Teke Ngomba PhD Student, IMV, Aarhus University

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  1. Signs of ‘Modernity’, Mimicry or Media of Relevance? ICTs and the Changing Phases of Political Campaign Communication in sub-Saharan Africa Teke Ngomba PhD Student, IMV, Aarhus University

  2. Introduction… • South Africa: (ITU: about ten people out of one hundred have access to the Internet but about ninety per cent have mobile phones). In April 2009, SA, political parties adopted mobile social networking campaigns using both the Internet and mobile phone in an unprecedented way in the history of campaigning in South Africa (see Walton & Donner, 2009) • Rwanda: (ITU just about one person out of one hundred has Internet access) 2 July 2010-ahead of the August 2010 elections, Kagame’s BBC Profile : ‘’with a website that ‘boasts Twitter, Flickr, podcasts and his own blog, Mr. Paul Kagame, lanky and soft-spoken’ portrays himself as ‘a modern day-politician who sees social media as championing democracy and development’

  3. Introduction… • Nigeria: (ITU- just about six persons out of one hundred have access to the Internet). On 15 September 2010, President Goodluck Jonathan of Nigeria announced that he will be a candidate for the 2011 presidential elections- on Facebook • Cameroon: Dr. Vincent Fouda’s presidential annoucement • Emerging studies examining political parties’ use of new ICTs (e.g • But few in-depth studies examining how politicians and political parties perceive new ICTs (exception, e.g Struwig & Conradie, 2003)

  4. Introduction…. • Focus: • a. Empirically begin to ascertain how political parties/politicians perceive the usefulness or not of the Internet in their campaign communication strategies • b. Suggest provisional interpretive lenses to examine patterns of new media use by political parties in Africa • c. Identify the six main possible areas that future research should focus on • Offshoot in systemic theory of political campaign communication (Blumler and Gurevitch, 1977, 2000, 2004, Voltmer, 2006) • Media-to-blame- logic in campaign communication change literature

  5. Systemic… • Radio:Norris (2000:168) ‘the introduction of radio broadcasting in the UK in 1924 permanently altered the way campaigns were fought in the UK’ • Television: Negrineand Lilleker (2002:309) ‘the changes in political campaign communication are closely related to the development of the new medium of television’. • Television: , Papathanassopoulos et al (2007:17) ‘the introduction of television from the 1950s transformed the nature of election campaigning and the relationship between politics, political parties and publics’. • Internet: ‘The Internet has changed party communications in complex ways’ (Norris , 2005:12) • Internet: ‘increasingly relevant tool in campaigns’ (Vaccari, 2008:647) • Internet: , ‘no contemporary campaign can ever be able to fully function without the Internet’ (Johnson, 2004:111).

  6. New ICTs in SSA… • ICT sector in SSA is developing ‘more and more rapidly’ (Chéneau-Loquay, 2000:219). • ITU, 2008: 18 mobile phone subscribers in sub-Saharan Africa for every one hundred people while there were about 3 internet users for every one hundred people • 8.5 mobile owners in Cameroon, about 4 Cameroonians out of 100 have access to the Internet by 2008 according to the ITU. • Data Collection

  7. Findings… • Internet Adoption-Yet Reticence and the Rationalization of these… • Adoption rationales: • Internet as Channel 1: Party websites and Diaspora Campaign Communication (sort of two step flow?) • Internet as channel 2: (block email, press releases to journalists) • Internet as source of information on campaign communication. • ‘I spend so much time to study what the Americans do, what developed democracies do around the world- we go online, sometime we watch TV and of course I do a lot of buying and reading of political materials. I invest a lot on that…and this has allowed me to develop myself politically and be associated with good practices’ (Mbella, CPDM).

  8. Findings… • Understanding Internet offlineness- 3 key reasons • a. Cost of being online and lack of technical wherewithal • b. Internet as ‘inappropriate’ technology and differing levels of ‘Internet inappropriateness for campaign communication’ • ‘Availability and Access-based inappropriateness’ • ‘In our local milieu here, you talk of the Internet, how many people have Internet here? Very few, very few. Even the commercial houses, you can count them’ (Ngale, CPDM). • ‘Functional Inappropriateness’ Internet as less ‘personal’. ‘Politics here in Cameroon is man-to man, it is contact!’ (John, UPC). • c. Lack of political vision and foresight

  9. Findings…. • The SDF • ‘lacks vision, I cannot edit my criticism of it, there are no two ways to it, there is no vision, especially with the party leadership, they do not know that this is a communication age and that the media has a very crucial role to play...It became very difficult for any of us in the communication unit to cause the party leader to see that what he can take a year and not be able to achieve can be done within a few minutes on an important television or radio communication, so when you have a system like that you find that you are operating in the 21st century with a communication superhighway with somebody who is still thinking of the age of drums’ (Nkemngu, former SDF, now CPDM).

  10. Findings…. • Political Parties, ICTs and Diaspora • Diaspora as target of communication via Internet • Diaspora as advisors • Diaspora as technical support-website creation, hosting • So, how can we analytically approach these emerging patterns visible as concerns new ICTs and political parties/politicians in SSA? • The case for a trilogical ensemble framework: • Emerging patterns could be seen as depicting signs of • a. ‘Modernization’ • b. Mimicry • c. New ICTs as Media of Relevance in SSA

  11. Findings…. • a. ‘Modernity’: Nkemngu… • ‘we are a modern party’ (Ndembiyembe, CPDM) • ‘the evolution of the communications technology in the world also helps the CPDM to modernize its campaign strategy. At first we didn’t use to have Internet but the CPDM now has a website’ (Enanga, CPDM). • b. ‘Mimicry’: • 1. Mimicry of style: ‘others are doing it, why not me’ and a ‘don’t want to be left behind’ attitude. • ‘you can’t afford to stay backward. Everybody now, look like Obama succeeded in his campaigns because of the strong communication strategies’ (Enanga, CPDM, emphasis added).

  12. Findings…. • 2. Mimicry in Structure:…. • a new website for the SDF party being developed is ‘inspired by the Obama campaign’ (Joshua, SDF) • SA Parties, ‘building a complex ‘Obama-esque’ campaign website’ (Walton & Donner , 2009:7) • c. New ICTs as Media of Relevance: • ‘Internet is increasing. It risks being an important element. We did not over use the Internet during the 2007 municipal and legislative elections but we think this time around we are going to use it’ (Nzipang, MP).

  13. In Lieu of a Conclusion….The Road Ahead FRQ1: Beyond issues of access and poverty, what role does political culture play in the adoption of new ICTs by parties and politicians and in its use by the electorate in Africa? FRQ2: In African countries where parties have used new ICTs for campaigns, how many people got campaign messages from new ICTs and with what impact on their voting decisions for instance? FRQ3: To what extent does a country’s electoral and political system; the level of freedom of expression in the country as well as a political party’s leadership structure and the culture of leadership within a party, favor or hinder the party’s adoption of new ICTs? FRQ4: What are the broader nation-wide democratic ramifications of the adoption of new ICTs in campaigns and the manner in which these are done in Africa?

  14. In Lieu of a Conclusion….The Road Ahead • FRQ5: What are the different ways through which Africa’s diaspora is contributing to the establishment of techno-campaigns in the region? And lastly, • FRQ5: Can an eventual adoption of new ICT-based campaigning in Africa curtail prevalent election time neo-patrimonial tendencies of ‘gift-giving/vote buying’ or would the latter rather negatively affect the establishment of the former?

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