How Social Media Fueled ‘Occupy Nigeria’ Protests

Social media played a profound role in recruiting and spreading calls for action that contributed to the success of the recent strike and street protests organized by the Nigeria Labour Congress (NLC) and Trade Union Congress (TUC) in response to removal of subsidy on Petroleum Motor Spirit (PMS), Nigeria CommunicationsWeek can now reveal.
As many still sat to digest the New Year’s Day announcement by President Goodluck Jonathan, some initial online activities by some civil rights activists’ triggered chains of messages reaching huge numbers of people who immediately mobilized to protest the removal even before labour formally flagged off the strike and protests.
So as Nigerians woke up on the first day of the protests, the virtual world was already agog with Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, MySpace, Google+ and so on, aggressively organizing and inspiring a Nigerian ‘Harmattan Storm’, a kind of so-called Arab Spring.
From North to South and East to West, arguments on social media swung left and right largely influenced by a crop of bloggers, but all agreeing on the need for openness in government and better life for Nigerians.
Nigeria CommunicationsWeek investigations show that the influence of the social media was buoyed by the country’s growing online audience.
Today, Nigeria has the largest online audience in Africa and a teledensity of 60 per cent with over 90 million mobile phone users.
Substantial numbers of the mobile phone users have access to internet through their mobile devices which helped in the sharing of information on social media.
Gbenga Sesan, an internet expert said that social media groups like Facebook and Twitter played very prominent role in the fuel subsidy removal protests.
Sesan, said the medium was used effectively in three different areas, which included, kick starting the conversation of ‘Occupy Nigeria’, code name of the six-day strike and street protests.
Using these social networking sites, Nigerians were able to organize the protests with messages like “let’s meet at Ojota by 9am tomorrow” “no fuel subsidy removal” and so on.
 Nigeria CommunicationsWeek checks also revealed that Facebook and Twitter, also helped in the coverage and reporting of events around the protests as pictures of happening were shared.
Sesan cited an incident in Kano where 50 youths gathered at a parade ground and used social media to a pull large crowd that joined them in the protest
Deji Kadri, an internet application provider, said that unlike the previous strike actions, social media helped in disseminating uncensored information as raw as they came during the protests.
He explained that social media bridged the gap between the North and South albeit, temporarily as the messages shared had no boundaries.

President Jonathan also acknowledged the power of the social media network when he lamented in Abuja recently, during the launch of the public mass transit buses that:
“There are a lot of mischief makers going around to misinform Nigerians, especially through social networks like the Twitter, Blackberry, Facebook and others – to communicate very wrong things to Nigerians.”