Ghana Election 2012: A Digital Walk-through

Tomorrow is election day in Ghana, my country. A lot has been going on on the Internet and social media this year with regards to campaigning and civic activism. The main goal is to whip up the enthusiasm of the youth for the elections and in matters of governance. Today's been very quiet, compared to previous days, when we were inundated incessantly with campaign messages. I've been through different towns- Accra, Ho, Keta, Aflao and Tema. Politics is heavy everywhere! A lot has been written about social media's relevance in the elections too.

Issues 

Kwesi Acquah put together the wordle below to capture some of the key things Ghanaians have been discussing leading to the elections:

Ghana Elections 2012 Wordle. Credit: Kwesi Acquah (@kwesiacquah)

I created this other one using content from ghanadecides.com at worditout.com:

Ghana Elections 2012 Wordle created using content from ghanadecides.com

Obviously, personality and party issues are intertwined with the real issues of the people.

Civic Activism

BloggingGhana, through its Ghana Decides project, has been at the helm of using the Internet and social media to engender more discussions and actions around the elections. Aljazeera recently hosted the team on its renowned social media show, Stream. Ghana Decides' latest campaign, Our Vote, Our Voice, seeks to get Ghanains to pledge to vote in December.

African Elections Project has also deployed new media tools to collect citizen reports, via Ushahidi, to ensure that the elections are credible. They're also providing social media training and coverage on election issues.

Google Student Ambassadors also recently run My Voice GH series to express their views on various issues that affect their day-to-day lives.

There are other groups doing some work in their own right.

Software Tools

It is always heartwarming to see the developer community invent tools that address the direct needs of the community. This syncs well with a personal mantra: "we must use the tools we have to solve the problems we face." Here are a few of them.

VoteKast Afrika: Collates results and Displays them in graphical format as they come in.

Ghana Vote Compass: An interesting tool that tries to predict your political leanings based on your inputs. This tool might be handy for those who haven't made up their minds yet.

The 2012 elections in Ghana will be closely fought. It is interesting to see the Internet and social media play a significant role in it for the first time.

Are there any campaigns or apps that you know pertaining to the elections? Please don't hesitate to share!

Ghana, Get Out the Vote! Our Vote is Our Voice in Election 2012

#GhanaDecides, #LetsVote, #OurVoteOurVoice

The 2012 general elections in Ghana is a week away, and the stakes are really high this time around. Candidates are tackling issues and policies in an unprecedented fashion, a sitting president joined the IEA presidential debates for the first time and social media is abuzz with election talk. It seems like the country can't wait for 7th December. Even though all indications point to the continuation of the traditional NDC-NPP duopoly, smaller parties like CPP and the newly-formed PPP are holding their own admirably- perhaps they will see a spike in their fortunes. It seems to many, though, that the PNC is on a downward trajectory.

The elections is not all about political parties and politicians. Ghana Decides, the foremost social media initiative around Elections 2012, recently launched Our Vote Our Voice, a campaign to get all Ghanaians to execute their civic duty in a peaceful manner.

"The purpose of the campaign is to promote communal voting... We believe peer-to-peer influence is still high and people could call up friends to vote or post updates to say #iVoted which may encourage others to vote.”

“Ghanaians must know that they have to vote because it is the in the interest of their children, their sisters and all of us. If you refuse to vote, it is like saying you don’t care about the people you love.”

Our Vote, Our Voice comes after many other  initiatives undertaken by this group of civic activists from BloggingGhana namely iRegistered, social media workshops, community engagements, Ghana Decides Tag, Speak Ghana, online discussions and event coverage.

Read the full press release on ghanadecides.com.

Online and offline forms have been created to to receive pledges from registered voters. Ghana Decides volunteers will follow-up pledges with emails and phone calls to encourage all those who pledged to go out and vote in the election. 

PLEDGE NOW TO VOTE IN THE 2012 ELECTIONS.

Join the conversation by following @ghanadecides on Twitter, liking the Ghana Decides Facebook page and subscribing to the YouTube Channel. #LetsVote!