The last three months have seen great changes to the African leadership landscape - not only on the ground, but on Facebook too.
“The focus of African social media has shifted to revolutionary themes,” notes Online Africa, a site that collects and analyses data surrounding connectivity, social media and Internet usage on the continent.
Leaders from some of the continent's most troubled states made appearances on the top 10 list for the most Facebook fans in December last year. This list included Ben Ali, of Tunisia; Hosni Mubarak, of Egypt; Laurent Gbagbo, of the Ivory Coast; and Algeria's Abdelaziz Bouteflika. This calls into question the correlation between social media popularity of leaders and regime stability.
Nigerian president Goodluck Jonathan has led the social media race on the continent for a long time, and continues to do so with over 511 386 fans on his official page, a number which has grown by more than 50% in the last three months alone. Jonathan also has a healthy Twitter following of close to 8 000 followers.
On Jonathan's official Web site, the leader says he “represents a generation of Nigerians that identify with youth, as well as the older population”. One can even download the “I Believe in Goodluck” caller ring-back tone from the site.
While social media may be working for Jonathan, Facebook popularity has not boded well for other leaders in the top 10.
In December last year, both Ben Ali and Mubarak were sitting pretty in the top 10, with 232 424 and 15 723 fans, respectively. The ex-Tunisian president's Facebook page has now ceased to exist, while Mubarak's fan base has increased to over 27 000.
Likes or dislikes?
“Fan” may, however, not be the appropriate word for the people who choose to “like” certain African leaders' pages. In the case of Mubarak, his growing Facebook following may be due to the international interest in the fall of the Egyptian leader.
Disputed Ivory Coast president Laurent Gbagbo now has nearly 32 000 fans, after only having 16 000 three months ago. Internationally recognised Alassane Ouattara, on the other hand, hardly has a Facebook presence.
Facebook has been very quiet, however, when it comes to Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi. The most official looking page for the despot is simply a Wikipedia entry, with a paltry 180 fans - this is despite Libya's substantial Internet user base.
Other countries with relatively poor Internet access, such as Lesotho, show a healthy Facebook following of over 4 000 fans for King Letsie III.
Looking local
SA's Jacob Zuma is in the top 10 on the continent, with over 20 000 fans on an unofficial Facebook page. There are, however, multiple parody pages, which have attracted considerably more fans.
For example, the “Help us stop Jacob Zuma becoming SA's next president” group, which, although out-dated, still has over 65 000 members. An anti-Julius Malema page also has over 131 000 fans, while opposition leader Helen Zille has over 151 000 fans.
Zuma still has some catching up to do in the social media race when compared to US president Barack Obama's 18 820 406 Facebook fans.
While a cause-effect relationship between Facebook fans and regime stability is tenuous, there does appear to be growing interest in politicians online, with an average 24% increase in the number of fans for a given African leader over the last three months.
The detailed statistics and full list of African leaders and Facebook presence for March 2011 can be seen on the Online Africa site.
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