Politics, Social Media and E campaigning in Africa South Africa Nigeria Familiarities during Their 2019 Presidential Elections

Social media in today's world of electioneering in Africa has gained popularity not mainly as an efficient medium of articulating and propagating manifestos but more for political grandstanding. This study sought to theorize about the utilitarian value of social media use in Africa's e campaigning by examining its application in the 2019 Presidential Elections in South Africa and Nigeria. The study's theoretical framework is based on key research works on e electioneering and perception of social media e campaign messaging. It employed the narrative technique to describe interview data and also presenting the same in quantitative content analysis format. Data were gathered from interviews with post graduate candidates in politics departments in the understudied countries to gauge the perception of the functional value of social media campaign sloganeering. The study finds that social media served a more optimal value from a moralistic perspective in the 2019 electioneering in South Africa than Nigeria. It notes that this finding derives from a more prevalent political culture of civility and a better functional public order to punish misuse of social media which prevailed in South Africa than Nigeria. Ikemefuna Taire Paul Okudolo "Politics, Social Media and E-campaigning in Africa: South Africa-Nigeria Familiarities during Their 2019 Presidential Elections" Published in International Journal of Trend in Scientific Research and Development (ijtsrd), ISSN: 2456-6470, Volume-4 | Issue-6 , October 2020, URL: https://www.ijtsrd.com/papers/ijtsrd33695.pdf Paper Url: https://www.ijtsrd.com/management/marketing/33695/politics-social-media-and-ecampaigning-in-africa-south-africanigeria-familiarities-during-their-2019-presidential-elections/ikemefuna-taire-paul-okudolo