Physical campaign environment is better than virtual sphere as Osun voters go to polls on September 22 –Study

With 17 days to Osun 2018 governorship election, Positive Campaign Initiative, a group of independent researchers in Nigeria, has discovered that subtle campaign of the contesting political parties is better in physical environment than virtual sphere, where parties-politicians induced Facebook Users are creating fear through personality attack, bullying and negative narratives on candidates.

This was contained in a statement jointly issued by Messers Kamoru Aremu Salaudeen and Ridwan Abiola Kolawole on behalf of the group. According to the statement, the 30 days monitoring of the campaign shows that defection, certificate scandal, home based versus foreign based politicians, godfatherism, family affiliation, regionalism (Osun West Agenda), matching rigging, machinery and vote buying dominated physical environment.

On virtual environment, the group also found that “supporters of the different political parties and candidates engaged in tug of words which ensured narratives and counter narratives. For instance, the candidates of these political parties engaged in verbal attacks. While some are described incompetent, having no vision for the state, others are referred to as being reckless. Major political parties are victims of these verbal attacks.”

PCI reminds the public especially parties and their supporters that positive engagement promotes an atmosphere of peace, political efficacy and availability of options while a negative engagement creates an atmosphere of rife, chaos and political apathy.

The statement notes that political parties need to ensure that their campaigns feature qualitative and issue-based messages rather than digression which have no relevance to governance.

“We empower the electorate with adequate data-driven analysis of campaign messages of the political parties so that voters would not be swayed but rather make informed choice of candidates at all arms of government.

We serve as a secondary gatekeeping platform for campaign messages of political parties. We do this to enhance the sustainability of the Nigerian democratic culture, the statement adds.