Tambari: Journal of Media, Theatre and Communication Studies 1

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The Rise and Influence of Social Media in Political Participation in Nigeria During the
2019 General Elections: A Study of Sabon Gari Local Government Area, Kaduna State

BY
Faruk NANOH Bello
08067762799, [email protected]
Department of Mass Communication,
Faculty of Social Sciences,
Ahmadu Bello University, (ABU) Zaria.

Pius OGWUCHE Owoicho

08135406343, [email protected]
Department of Mass Communication,
College of Social Science and Management Sciences
Achievers University, Owo, Ondo State.

And

Daniel O. ODEH
09037958498 [email protected]
Department of Political Science
Faculty of Social Science
Ahmadu Bello University, (ABU) Zaria
Abstract
The potentials of social media in influencing political behaviours has become a topic of
debate in public space World-wide with the availability of digital plenitude and the increase
in the use of different social media platforms for such purposes, but from the perspectives of
the third world countries like Nigeria, there is a deficiency of empirical literature to justify
these assertions. Using survey design, this study examined the influence of social media on
political participation of residents of Sabon Gari Local Government Area of Kaduna State in
the 2019 general elections in Nigeria; more specifically, the factors that influenced their
participation in political activities during this period. With the use of questionnaire as the
instrument for data collection, findings from the study postulates that social media has
influenced the participation in political activities among people of Sabon Gari Local
Government Area of Kaduna State during the 2019 general elections in Nigeria. The study
also revealed that Facebook, WhatsApp, Instagram, and twitter were the most frequently
utilized social media platform to engage in political discourse during the 2019 general
elections, while it also projects that in the nearest future in Nigeria, with the continuous
development and consciousness of people towards the dividends’ of utilizing social media for
political participation, more people would be engaged in political activism through the social
media because digital plenitude is making access to social media more cheaper and gives
solace to those who wouldn’t want to participate physically in political activities.

Keywords: Social media, Political participation, Social networks, Influence, election,

Kaduna

Introduction

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Overtime, the adoption of social media in election campaigns in Nigeria have grown
steadily. The media is very important when it comes to political participation, owing to its
ability to influence diverse publics. The popularity and rise in the influence of social media
which is seen to have transformed the relationship between politicians and electorates have
attracted the attention of academics (Lilleker and Jackson, 2010; Fuchs, 2013). According to
Nielsen and Vaccari (2013), researchers have studied the rise and use of the Internet in
political communication from different approaches. Some researchers have explored the
engagement of citizens with political actors and their mutual interaction during election
campaigns; others have discussed whether (and to what extent) the specific communication
platforms designed by political elites have facilitated large-scale direct communication with
the citizenry.
Undoubtedly, political decisions are made regarding political parties, policies and
programmes based on the information received from the media. For instance, in 2008, social
networking gained popularity and was effectively deployed by the Obama campaign to
mobilize and organize supporters (Hendricks and Denton, 2010). No wonder, there is hardly a
candidate or a political party that can go into an election without an online presence. There is
little doubt about the effects of online media on political campaigns at all levels, which at the
end grows exponentially (Trent and Friedenberg, 2008, p. 408).
According to Kaid and Holtz-Bacha (2008), political communication includes the
following online tools which tend to be critical to the success of any political communication
process: blogging, podcasting, political web sites with mechanisms for online feedback and
participation, social networking, and online video sharing. Many scholars argued that
although new media tools are seen as playing a complementary role to traditional media
(Bimber and Davis, 2003; Holbert, 2005), there are several characteristics that distinguish it
from the mainstream media (Quintelier and Vissers, 2008).
In today’s world, citizens no longer depend solely on the mainstream media to learn
about politics and government but also through the online media: These media outlets can
influence voters through their slants in reporting matters concerning politics. In recent times,
social media primarily becomes one of the media used to reach out to the voting publics,
most especially when it comes to election and electoral campaigns. Social media is believed
to have a unique feature as it easily accessible to average citizenry and aids interactivity, as
well as provide room for direct contact with and instant feedback from politicians. There are
several levels of effects on the citizens which one might expect from online media use within
the context of political communication. These effects, according to Bimber and Davis (2003,

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p. 127), follow a schematic hierarchy, ranging from simply motivating more online visits to
motivating political action.
Problem Statement:
There are a lot of studies that suggest that media exposure can have a considerable
impact in shaping the public's political knowledge, attitudes, and behaviour. Many scholars
have argued that online media have positive and potentially strong effects on political
participation and knowledge (Hendricks and Denton, 2010; Norris, 2001; Papacharissi,
2002). News is important for citizen’s political participation (Patterson 2004). According to
Boulianne, (2009), Dalrymple and Scheufele, (2007) and Tolbert, McNeal, (2003), there are
significant positive relationships between the use of digital media and political participation
and knowledge. However, many researchers have argued that most researches were based on
cross-sectional surveys; hence, causality is not yet firmly established. At the moment, there is
a little or no studies on the influence of social media on political participation especially on
residents of Sabon Gari local government area of Kaduna State. Against this background, the
purpose of this paper is to examine the influence of social media on the political participation
of residents of Sabon Gari local government area of Kaduna State.
Objectives of the Study:
i. To determine how much time residents of Kaduna State commit to access political
messages on social media.
ii. To examine how residents interpret the political messages on social media.
iii. To examine the extent to which political messages in social media influence political
participation.
iv. To establish the social media platforms used by residents of Kaduna state for political
participation.
Research Questions:
This study is expected to provide answers to the following questions:
i. How much time do the residents of Kaduna State commit to access political messages
on social media?
ii. How do the residents interpret political messages on social media?
iii. To what extent have political messages from social media influenced their political
participation?
iv. Which social media platforms do residents of Kaduna state use for political
participation?

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Literature Review
Paradigm Shift in Political Participation
In recent times, there has being a paradigm shift in the way people participate in
political activities as stakeholders in any political process, and these paradigm shift can be
attributed to the vast availability of different media platforms to people who participate in any
political process either as electorates or politicians vying for political positions. Just as the
media has expanded the terrain of political participation so also technological advancement in
the mass media has made these processes of political participation through the media more
encompassing. According to Johansson (2019), technological development has led to the
emergence of newer media channels, and traditional media logic has been amplified with
network and social media logic. These changes made possible by these newer media have
influenced political communication and have provided a shift from the traditional top-down
communication patterns toward a more horizontal and interactive one.
To buttress how social media has impacted political processes, Madueke, Nwosu.,
Ogbonnaya and Anumadu (2017), carried out a study to examine the experiment of social
media use for political participation in Nigeria. Using the uses and gratifications theory, they
found out that the use of social media has grossly affected the participation of an individual in
their day to day political process. The researchers also pointed out that:

the roles of media in political participation in Nigeria cannot be over-emphasised

because as the world moves from what it used to be to a digital world, Nigeria should
not be left in the dark. We should rise to use the many dividends of technology to our
advantage. As a developing country, the social media can help in cutting down the
cost of seeking public opinion and to ensure that the will of the masses are translated
into policies that will benefit all. Social media offer participatory democracy at its
best, the technology that promotes transparency, efficiency and greater accuracy in
the political process (Madueke et al, 2017, pp 53).

It is worth noting that there might be some reasons why the social media is becoming a
centre stage in peoples’ participation in politics in the 21st century as expressed by Effing,
Hillegersberg and Huibers (2011), to them, recent years have seen a decline in non-profit
community participation such as political party membership. Also, there are several
challenges when it comes to engaging people in party politics. This is to say that most people
find it had to join party politics not just because of the parties’ ideologies but because they

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want to benefit from what that party could offer them in return as benefits, and that is what is
affecting Nigerian political participation at the moment where people easily change their
political allegiance likewise communities.
It can be seen vividly in some communities in Nigeria from the 2019 general
elections, precisely in Kwara state, where the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) was formerly
the ruling party in the state from the elections in 2015 but in 2019, it was a different ball
game entirely. People’s perceptions about politics can be easily tampered with using the
different social media platforms, which is why Effing et al, are of the opinion that many
political parties are afraid to lose control over their message when they delegate power and
authority to the public but at the same time internet use by citizens is becoming more social
and participatory, so it would be more beneficiation to political parties to engage properly
with the public using the social media handle.
In another argument by De-Wit, Brick and Van Der Linden (2019), although they
concur with the fact that social media influence political participation, they also expressed
some reservations on the social media influences on political participation. For them, social
media is driving the rise of political polarization and at the same time, they believe that the
other side in the political divide is becoming more negative. In their study, De-Wit et al
(2019) submit that since 1994, the number of Americans who see the opposing political party
as a threat to “the nation’s well-being” has doubled. To them, this deepening polarization has
predictable results which include: government shutdowns, violent protests, and scathing
attacks on elected officials through the social media.
In attributing the findings of De-Wit et al’s to the situation of political participation in
Nigeria, one can also see the impact of political polarization promoted on social media. It can
be seen evidently from the last general elections in Nigeria in 2019 where different political
parties used social media to attack each other and to spread unverified information about their
opponents. A clear example was the portrayal of the incumbent president of Nigeria,
Muhammadu Buhari, by the opposition Peoples’ Democratic Party (PDP) as unqualified to
contest the presidential election since they alleged, he did not possess a secondary school
certificate. This story trended on social media and had a lot of political followership at that
time until that allegation was debunked by the media team of the president using social
media.
Although De-Wit, Brick and Van Der Linden (2019), suggest that there are probably
many reasons why social media is driving political polarization, they believed, Facebook,
Reddit, and Twitter which are some of the widely used social media have all become sites of

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ferocious political arguments. While political polarization definitely plays out on social
media, it has succeeded with evidence to date, according to them, which suggests that its
impact is subtler than it appears.
Political Participation
The arguments about political participation have created a dichotomy amongst
political communicators and political actors, even among academics, the debate is still about
political participation and the controversies it creates. According to Tsandzana (2018), with
the emergence of social media, the phenomenon of political participation should be
understood as a continuous and complex process, because for long-time voting (elections)
was considered as the privileged mechanism of political participation.
Brady, Schlozman, and Verba, (1999) define political participation as any behavior by
ordinary citizens directed towards influencing some political outcomes. While to Adeyanju
and Haruna (2012), political participation can be studied in many ways which may be taken
from the angle of external stimulants or compulsion by objects outside the participant, which
move him to take part in political activity in one form or the other. In another perspective,
political participation could be viewed as citizens’ involvement in the acts, events or
activities that influence the selection or the actions taken by a political representative.
Madueke et al (2017), citing Chatora (2012) see political participation as the various
mechanisms through which the public express their public views and exercise their influence
on the political process.
To Nay (2014), political participation can be buttressed as all practices ranging from
voting, demonstrating, campaigning, attending meetings, expressions of interest, i.e. learning
about politics and debates between politicians and the citizens about public affairs, while in
local, regional and national areas, Abubakar (2011) sees political participation as the
involvement of people not necessarily active in any political process before a collective
decision is arrived at. In a nutshell, just as political interest is a political concept that is very
significant for the emergence of democratic political identity and also serves as a crucial
force for the exploration and the desire to participate in political activities as expressed by
Kahne and Bowyer (2018), the emergence of social media has helped in strengthening the
nexus between social media and political participation. Political participation therefore entails
an evident citizen engagement in the discourse of socio-political and economic issues that
serve as a yardstick for choosing would-be leaders, and which may also include assessing
incumbencies and advocating ways of curbing social vices for a more prosperous country.

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Social Media and Political Participation:

In understanding modern citizenship, civic engagement, and the contemporary public
sphere, it is pertinent to appraise the significant role played by social media users in
providing this understanding. According to Egbunike (2017) citing Putnam, 1995a, 1995b,
2000; Rahn and Transue, 1998, political participation of young people is on the decline in
Western countries and this can be attributed to the emergence of digital plenitude, which has
given rise to the use of social media by the young people to engage in politics. In a recent
study conducted by Kaur and Verma (2016) in India, it was revealed that Internet usage has
shown drastic growth in the initial half of the year 2015 in India. The user base has increased
to over 354 million and with this India has become the second country after China in terms of
internet usage. They assert that Facebook is the prime social networking site that is used by
96% of urban users, followed by Google Plus (61%), Twitter (43%) and LinkedIn (24%).
This extensive use of social media by the public had attracted the attention of the politicians
in India to use it for election campaigns, and it has given researchers a reason to find out how
politicians are engaging the public through these platforms.
This findings by the studies of Kaur and Verma (2017) corroborate the findings of
Skoric and Zhu (2015), who asserted while citing Macafee and De Simone, 2012; Skoric and
Poor, 2013; Valenzuela, Park, and Kee, 2009; Vitak Smock, Carr, Ellison, and Lampe, 2011,
that numerous studies have examined the uses of social media for citizen engagement,
concluding that they act as effective platforms for developing civic skills, promoting bridging
social ties, engaging in political discussions, mobilizing the electorate, and organizing offline
political activities. To this effect, it could be deduced that the influence of social media on the
electorate has been proved from its successful use in the US presidential election in 2008 and
by political parties in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections in India.
It is important to note that political engagement through social media is not limited to
adults, but that there is evidence that young people increasingly use social media for online
political participation (Yang and DeHart 2016). The use of social media to engage in political
discussion is on the rise in Nigeria. The youths in Nigeria find solace in using social media to
challenge the political decisions of their leaders, even though they might not participate in
mainstream political activism. Wei (2016: 180) states that the use of mobile media in making
political decisions is becoming popular in many countries. Especially younger people are
using social networking platforms such as Twitter to develop a new biography of citizenship,
which is characterised by a more individualised form of activism that deliberately situates
their struggles outside the party political realm (Mhlomi and Osunkunle, 2017, pp 149-150).

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According to Skoric and Zhu (2015), in the digitalized 21st century, social media use consists
of heterogeneous practices, ranging from passive consumption to active opinion expression
and even occasional deliberation. People use social media to look for information, seek
solace and vent dissatisfactions, express opinions, engage in social conversations, and discuss
issues of the day. The technological revolution in general and the Internet, in particular, has
changed the world to a great extent by connecting people from different corners. In agreeing
with the assertions of Zhang and Wang, (2010), Skoric and Zhu (2015), postulate that
different structural designs and technological features of these social media platforms attract
diverse types of people, encourage different communicative practices, and promote the
creation of distinct types of political networks.
In a nutshell, social media has opened the door to youths who are believed to be active
users of social media to engage more in political activities and participation and youths
recently have become so enthusiastic about events and happenings around them particularly
in political activities. Their quest to know and learn more about political activities propels
them to develop their interest in politics and social issues by getting more information,
through information seeking about political parties and candidates as well as sharing political
information, showing their interest by voluntarily following political figures and engaging in
political discussions through different social media platforms (Kyranakis and Nurvala, 2013).
Theoretical Framework
Further to the literature review is an adaption and examination of the theoretical
underpinning upon which this study is carried out. The study made use of the Social Impact
Theory (SIT) and the Use and Gratification Theory to provide a blueprint for this study.
Social Impact Theory:
According to Gonzalez (2016), the Social Impact Theory (SIT) was developed by
Bibb Latané in 1981 as a framework for understanding the general rules that guide the
formation of communities and relationships. Social impact refers to, as Latané notes, "the
great variety of changes in physiological states and subjective feelings, motives and
emotions, cognitions and beliefs, values and behavior, that occur in an individual as a result
of the real, implied, or imagined presence or actions of other individuals," (Latané and Wolf,
1981). In expressing Latané and Wolf’s views, Gonzales warns that Social Impact Theory
was not developed for its specificity or its ability to explicate the exact methods by which
social impact is transferred from an individual to another. Social Impact Theory simply
proposes that social impact is divided into social forces (strength, immediacy, and number)
and that the impact of each social force can be described mathematically.

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While to Bourgeois (2017), Social Impact Theory was proposed by Latané in 1981 to
predict how and when sources of social influence will affect a target of the influence. It is a
very broad theory, seeking to encompass a variety of thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and
physiological states. When other people are sources of social influence on a target person, the
impact is predicted to be a multiplicative function of the strength, immediacy, and number of
sources. When other people are co-targets of social influence, social impact is predicted to be
divided as an inverse power function of the strength, immediacy, and number of the targets.
The theory was proposed as a descriptive model, or metatheory, as opposed to an explanatory
one. It was influenced by ideas in sociology, astronomy, geography, etc.
Shift communications (2019), postulates that in 1981, long before social media
existed, Ohio State University psychologist Bibb Latané coined the Social Impact Theory
after conducting a series of experiments to validate his hypothesis about how influence
works. Three factors make up social impact within his theory:
· Strength: How important is the influencing group to the target of the influence?
· Immediacy: How close in proximity in time is the influencing group to the target of the
influence?
· Number: How many people are in the influencing group?
Latané’s three rules of influence are based on these factors:
· Impact is a function of strength, immediacy, and a number of sources.
· The greater the number of sources, the greater the impact.
· The most significant impact occurs between 0 sources and 1 source.
According to Andrzej, Jacek and Latané (1990), a computer simulation modeled the
change of attitudes in a population resulting from the interactive, reciprocal, and recursive
operation of B. Latané's theory of social impact, which specifies principles underlying how
individuals are affected by their social environment. To them, surprisingly, several macro-
level phenomena emerged from the simple operation of this micro-level theory, including an
incomplete polarization of opinions reaching a stable equilibrium, with coherent minority
subgroups managing to exist near the margins of the whole population.
This theory explains perfectly the aims of this study. As postulated by this theory,
social media in the modern era influences political participation because minority groups in
the society who could not influence political activities in the mainstream media or in public
can do so from the comfort of their privacy through social media. The social media using the
social impact theory has given those deprived a sense of belonging. Also, it has improved the

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level of reciprocal political participation and communication where political activists and
players in the political domain can get feedback on political issues as fast as possible.
As buttressed by this theory, aside from the immediacy provided by the social media,
social media has increased the number of people who engage and participate in politics and
because of the high level of influence the social media is believed to have, it has given
strength to political parties and also individual groups to sale their political ideas using the
social media and at present, going by the assertions of Egbunike et al (2017) stated that, in
Nigeria, social media has advanced political participation through civic, online and offline
engagements. In their views, Nigeria has a population of about 170 million people, out of
which 86,219,965 are internet users, with an internet penetration of 46.1% which contributes
2.5% to the over 3.4 billion global Internet users (InternetLiveStats, 2016).
The top ten most visited sites by Nigerians are Google.com, Google.com.ng,
Facebook.com, Yahoo.com, Youtube.com, Twitter.com, Jumia.com.ng, Linkedin.com,
Nairaland.com and Instagram.com (Alexis, 2016). This shows that Facebook and Twitter are
two of the most frequented social media sites in Nigeria. The Economist (2010) declared that
Facebook was the second most popular site on the internet after Google. The use of Facebook
by Nigerians has increased over the years. Nigeria is the most active African country in
political conversations on Twitter, followed by South Africa, Ethiopia, Burundi and Egypt
(Portlands-How Africa Tweets.com, 2016). With all this empirical evidence, this study
concurs with the assumptions of the Social Impact Theory as it deliberately depicts the
present political situation in Nigeria.
Uses and Gratification Theory
Uses and Gratification Theory (UGT) is an audience-centered approach that focuses
on what people do with media, as opposed to what media does to people. McQuail, (1994)
asserts that what mass communication scholars today refer to as the Uses and Gratifications
approach is generally recognized to be a sub-tradition of media effects research. This study is
also tailored along with the assumptions of the Uses and Gratification Theory. The theory
builds off of a history of communication theories and research. Its beginnings lie in
researchers’ studies of radio listeners in the 1940s. Other researches at that time looked into
children’s comics and the absence of newspapers during the newspaper strike (David, 2016).
According to Ruggiero (2000), some mass communications scholars have contended
that Uses and Gratifications Theory is not a rigorous social science theory, but he argued for
the opposite. To him, any attempt to speculate on the future direction of mass communication
theory must seriously include the Uses and Gratifications approach because the emergence of

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computer-mediated communication has revived the significance of Uses and Gratifications

Theory. This is as a result of the fact that Uses and Gratifications Theory has always provided
a cutting-edge theoretical approach in the initial stages of each new mass communications
medium, be it newspapers, radio and television, and now the internet.
The assumption of the theory as buttressed by Madueke et al (2017) is that people
influence the effects media have on them. That is to say that Uses and Gratification Theory
takes a more humanistic approach to media use and effect. It assumes that members of the
audience are not passive but play an active role in interpreting and integrating media into
their own lives. The theory suggests that people use media to fulfill specific gratifications and
this can be used to explain how people use social media to gratify their political needs. The
theory allows for political participation through social media, people are not pressurized to go
in-line with every political discourse. Using this theory, people could use the theory to
critique performances of their political leaders, suggest political solutions, make a particular
political topic to trend through clickbait and likes on social media handles as well as abuse
political opponents or political leaders who do not do well. These are all angles the Uses and
Gratification Theory could be applied to this study.
David (2016) is of the opinion that today, Uses and Gratification Theory is more
relevant than ever as a tool for understanding how individuals connect with the technologies
around them. These technologies span everything from the internet to video gaming to mobile
phones. To him, Uses and Gratification Theory research into mobile phone usage has found
that people seek a number of gratifications from their phones, including affection/sociability,
entertainment, and mobility, among others. As another example of contemporary technology,
when using social media, users can be motivated by factors like the need to vent negative
feelings, recognition, and cognitive needs.
In a nutshell, the 2019 general elections in Nigeria saw the huge application of the
Uses and Gratification Theory by people during the elections and this could be attributed to
the social media consciousness of the Nigerian people and the zeal for engaging in political
discourse by Nigerians in line with the promise of free and fair elections by the Independent
Electoral Commission (INEC), which at the end came under intense scrutiny due to the
antecedents from the accusations of elections malpractices by the opposition Peoples’
Democratic Party (PDP) on the whole electioneering process in 2019.

Methodology

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This paper employed survey method in order to explore the influence of social media
on political participation with a focus on the 2019 elections. Those of voting age in Sabon
Gari Local Government Area of Kaduna State formed the population for this study. Through
purposive and accidental sampling techniques, 384 respondents of voting age were examined.
The questionnaire was the instrument used to get responses from the respondents. Of the 384
copies of the questionnaire distributed to the respondents, only 355 were duly filled and
returned.

Results and Discussions

Descriptive analysis was used to analyse 355 validly retrieved copies of the
questionnaire with the aid of SPSS 21.0.

Table 1: Demography of Respondents

Demography Frequency Percentage (%)
Sex
Male 191 53.8
Female 164 46.2
Total 355 100
Age
18-25 128 36.1
26-35 116 32.6
36-45 68 19.2
45 and above 43 12.1
Total 355 100
Occupation
Self-employed 80 22.5
Employed 87 24.5
Unemployed 38 10.7
Student 150 42.3
Total 355 100

Table 1 above indicates about 87.9 % of the respondents are youths, given the age
range of youths to be between 18 years to about 65 years. The age distribution above reveals
that between the ages of 18 and 44, 87.9% represents an active youthful age. This can be
attributed to the fact that more youths engage in the use of social media. In addition, students’
respondents from Table 1 above are more prevalent this could be as a result of the fact that
Sabo Gari local government is located in the centre of learning in Kaduna State and more
students tend to use social media and the internet to comment and follow trending political
issues.
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Table 2: How frequent did respondents use social media for political discourse during
the 2019 elections
Response Frequency Percentage
Daily 236 66.5
Twice in a week 119 33.5
Never Nil
Total 355 100

Table 2 shows that majority of respondents 236 (66.5%) made use of social media
daily for political discourse, and 119 (33.5%) respondents made use of social media twice in
a week for political discourse. Social media is pervasive, every one of the respondents had
access to the internet through their phones and were in constantly using the social media for
one reason or the other, most especially for political discussion, in chat groups or to comment
on political issues online during the just concluded 2019 elections in Sabon Gari, and/or just
to like and follow the hot and trending topical political stories.
In a nutshell, there was a heavy commitment by the respondents to access political
messages and events on the social media during the 2019 general elections in Nigeria.
Furthermore, this heavy usage of the social media to access political messages by the
respondents in Sabo Gari local government area of Kaduna State could be attributed to the
usual high level of tension in Kaduna State during election periods, given the fact that the
state is known to be prone to pre-election crisis, election crisis and post-election crisis, and to
that effect, voters and those of voting age who preferred to stay indoors during the elections
choose to follow the political discourse online instead.

Table 3: Respondents involvement in political discussions on social media

Response Frequency Percentage
High 166 46.8
Moderate 132 37.1
Low 57 16.1
Total 355 100

The information in Table 3 revealed that most of the respondents, which accounted
for 46.8% involvement in political discussions on social media was high, 37.1% of the
respondents’ involvement in political discussion is moderate, while 16.1% of the
respondents’ involvement in political discussion was low. In this respect, it can be argued that
there was a reasonable involvement of respondents in political discussion during the general
elections given a 46.8% high and 37.1% moderate involvement, totalling about 62.9% of the
respondents actively used social media for political discussions during the 2019 general

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elections. This could be as a result of the zeal and enthusiastic nature of the electorates to
have a say during the elections.
Table 4: The frequently used social media platform in accessing political messages by
respondents during the 2019 elections
Response Frequency
Facebook 332 (93.5)
Twitter 196 (55.2)
YouTube 101 (28.5)
Podcasts 23 (6.7)
Instagram 267 (75.2)
WhatsApp 293 (82.5)

Table 4 reveals the social media platforms frequently used for political discourse
during the 2019 general elections in Sabon Gari local government area of Kaduna Sate. 332
respondents representing 93.5% of the respondents frequently used Facebook to access
political messages during the 2019 elections, while 293 respondents representing 82.5% of
the respondents made use of WhatsApp to access political messages, 267 respondents
representing 75.2% of the respondents used Instagram to access political messages during the
2019 elections, in addition, 196 respondents representing 55% of the respondents utilized
Twitter to access political messages during the elections, 101 respondents representing 28.5%
of the respondents used YouTube to access political messages during the 2019 elections and
23 respondents representing 6.7% of the respondents accessed political messages through
Podcast. The data presented in Table 4 indicates that respondents were allowed to make
multiple choices as most of the respondents indicated that they were multiple social media
platforms. Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, Twitter, were the most frequently used social
media platform by the respondents to access political messages, it can be deduced that this is
because of the popularity of the platforms and most social media platforms came together
with the phones being used by respondents at the point of purchase, so it allows for easy
access to respondents to use either of the different social media platforms if not all to
participate in political discussion.

Table 5: Respondents level of believability of political messages posted on social

networking sites
Response Frequency Percentage
Very High 96 27
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High 112 31.5

Moderate 85 24
Low 62 17.5
Total 355 100

The data in Table 5 above shows that the level of believability of political messages posted
on social media is high with 122 respondents representing 31.5%, 96 respondents
representing 27% believability of political messages posted on social media is very high, 85
respondents representing 24% believability of political messages posted on social media is
moderate, and 62 respondent representing 17.5% believability of political messages posted on
social media is low. From the information in the above table it can be implied that political
messages posted on social media were believed. Table 5 answers research question 2, the
respondent’s level of believability of social media messages would tend to make them
interpret them either positively or negatively. Their interpretations here is to believe majority
of the stories they see on social media which would tend to have an effect on how they react
to any political need.

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Table 6: Respondents interpretation of political messages on social media

Response Frequency Percentage
Propagandist 112 31.5
Deceitful 56 15.8
Credible 187 52.7
Total 355 100

The interpretation of political campaign messages on social media in Table 6 shows

that over half (52.7%) of the respondents view the messages as credible, 31.5% of
respondents views the messages on social media as propagandistic and 15.8% of respondents
thinks the political campaign messages on social media are deceitful. This implies that
majority of the respondents believe that the political messages on social media are not
credible. This could be as a result of the political terrain the respondents find themselves and
in addition to the failure of past political leaders of Nigeria who tend to promise a lot and
when they win elections, they tend to turn a blind eye to their campaign promises.
Table 7: The level of social media influence on political participation in the 2019
elections
Response Frequency Percentage
Great influence 194 54.6
Limited influence 105 29.6
No influence 56 15.8
Total 355 100

Table 7 reveals the level of social media influence on political participation in the
2019 elections amongst the respondents, majority of the responses which accounted for
54.6% shows that social media had great influence on their political participation in the 2019
elections, 105 respondents representing 29.6% level of social media influence on their
political participation in the 2019 elections was limited, and 56 respondents representing
15.8% were not influenced by social media on their political participation in the 2019
elections. This implies that majority of the respondents agree that social media is of great
influence on their political participation in the 2019 elections as they can stay in the comfort
of their homes and it participate political activities.

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Table 8: Political activities engaged in as a result of social media influence

Political Participation Frequency
Encourage to Vote 342 (96.3)
Engage in political Protest 48 (13.5)
Join a political party 87 (24.5)
Volunteer for political campaign 175 (49.3)
Debate political issues 238 (67)

Data from Table 8 shows that social media mostly influenced respondents to vote in
the 2019 elections as 342 respondents representing 96.3% of 355 respondents were
encouraged on social media to vote during the 2019 elections, 238 respondents representing
67% of 355 respondents engaged in political debates due to the influence of social media and
they found it easier to debate online that have a face to face political argument with people of
different political beliefs, 175 respondents representing 49.3% of 355 respondents were
influenced to volunteer for political campaign, 87 respondents representing 24.5% of 355
respondents were influenced to join a political party, and 48 respondents representing 13.5%
of 355 respondents were influenced by social media to engage in political protest. This is also
a multi-choice section which allowed respondents to select multiple choices because
respondents may have been influence by different social media platforms to participate in
more than one political activity, by this information revealed in Table 8 above, it can be
inferred that respondents were largely influence to vote, debate in political issues and
volunteer for political campaign.
Major Findings
1. Residents of Sabon Gari local government area of Kaduna State during the 2019
general elections were fond of the social media and through the different social media
platforms; they were regularly involved in political discussions. Facebook,
WhatsApp, Instagram, and Twitter were the most frequently utilized social media
platform for political discourse because there was a heavy commitment by the
respondents to access political messages and events on these social media platforms
during the 2019 general elections in Nigeria.
2. Respondents believed majority of the political messages posted on the social media
and these messages had a positive impact on them. In addition, respondents saw
political messages on social media to be credible and true and found it easy to act
upon.

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3. The interpretation of political campaign messages on social media had a great

influence on political participation among the respondents during the 2019 elections
in Sabon Gari Local Government Area of Kaduna State, with social media mostly
influencing the people to cast their vote, they debated on political issues and
volunteered during political campaigns.
4. With the continuous development and consciousness of people towards the dividends
of utilizing social media for political participation, the projection is that, in the future,
more people would be engaged in political activism through the social media because
digital plenitude is making access to social media cheaper as the day goes by and
many people would be able to afford the gadgets that have these social media.
In a nutshell, the study revealed that the respondents evidently utilized social media
regularly for political discourse because they are of the view that political messages on social
media are credible, though some may be propagandistic.

Conclusion and Recommendations

This study showed that social media had an influence on the participation in political
activities by the people of Sabon Gari Local Government Area of Kaduna State during the
general elections in Nigeria in 2019. It can also be seen from the study that it is not enough to
be physically present and participate in voting during elections for one to have the fulfilment
of participating in political activities and this is all thanks to the social media which provides
an alternative to participation in politics from the comfort of one’s home. One can participate
in political campaigns, symposiums, conferences, debates and even voting in the nearest
future all through the access provided by the social media. It is to this effect that the study
encourages people most especially youths to use social media more often to participate in
political issues and activities.
The study recommends that more studies is needed to be conducted from the
perspectives of the third world countries on how social media can be properly used for
effective political engagements given to the success recorded by the former president of the
United States of America, Barack Obama who used the social media for politics.
Furthermore, political parties in Nigeria need to have a paradigm shift from using the
mainstream media to using more of the social media to engage electorates in political
activism.

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