The Centre for Democracy and Development has just published a major study on social media and the 2023 election campaigns, which I summarise here (click here for the full report). Currently, the number of active social media users in Nigeria has risen from 27 million in 2019 to 36 million ahead of the 2023 elections. Given the challenge of prevailing misinformation and disinformation on social media platforms, and the way such disinformation can permeate into the media more generally, greater access to online information does not necessarily create more informed citizens. In fact, in Nigeria, it has confused the citizenry while entrenching pre-existing divides based on ethnicity and religion, especially as malinformation, the deliberate sharing of genuine information with an intent to cause harm, thrives in this election season.
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