Role of voter education in curbing electoral violence in the 2019 general elections in Enugu State, Nigeria (Published)
In recent years, every election season in Nigeria has been marred by a gory cycle of electoral violence that claim many innocent lives. The broad objective of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of the mass media, social media, and word-of-mouth communication as voter education tools for curbing electoral violence in the 2019 general elections in Enugu State of Nigeria. The study was conducted by using an opinion survey, and questionnaires distributed through physical and online methods were the major instruments for data collection. The respondents were made up of electorates drawn from the 23 local government areas of Enugu State, Nigeria. Results from the study indicate that the social media and mass media communication tools employed in voter education campaigns against electoral violence in the 2019 general elections in Enugu State, Nigeria, were not significantly effective, while the word-of-mouth communication approaches employed were effective. The ineffectiveness of the social media and mass media as communication channels for voter education aimed at curbing electoral violence in the State was traced to the disconnect between the messenger (Nigerian politicians) and their messages. The lack of trust among electorates for the political actors affected their acceptance of the messages on electoral violence from those channels because they were perceived as using them for mere publicity purposes and also doing things different from what they were preaching. Based on this outcome it was recommended among other things that a proactive nationwide voter education campaign should be initiated through social media, the mass media, and word-of-mouth communication to enlighten the Nigerian populace on the dangers of electoral violence before every election season in the country.
Keywords: Election, Mass Media, Social media, electoral violence, voter education, word-of-mouth communication.
Government Policies on Social Media Retail Business (Published)
The chain of influence between government, retail, and consumers is immense and takes different forms. The growth of the internet, specifically social media, has amplified the chain of influence. Governments influence on social media retail businesses, which influences the manner in which retailers influence their consumers. The chain of influence may come from either way and may begin with consumers or retailers to influence the government. However, the government`s engagement in social media has been in different forms, including governments as participants, governments as a regulator and government as an investor. Either of these approaches influence the manner in which the retail sector engages its consumers. This paper explores government policies that impact social media in the retail business. First, it will explore the influence of social media on retailers. It is then that government policies can be built on these influences to determine the chain of influence. The paper will consider issues of taxation, consumer rights, laws of quality, and government`s infrastructure policies.
Keywords: Investor, Regulator, Social media, government policy, participant
The Role of Social Media towards Political Accountability in Pakistan: A Literature Review (Published)
Democracy is globally accepted form of government, especially when the technological development going to make this world a global village. Scholars think about the ideas of global democratic government, wherein short fall of democracy is ill-fated. However, political accountability is the essential characteristics of democracy and it cannot flourish without it. This paper adopts a qualitative approach by using qualitative content analysis and observation over social networking sites (SNS), in which democracy, accountability, and freedom of expression will extensively use. The extensive literature review indicates that social media facilitates the freedom of expression, provides opportunities of direct political participation, improves the electoral process and increase political accountability in authoritarian countries and emerging democracies. However, an emerging democracy like Pakistan, where social media trend is up surging and accountability condition is destitute. It is highly justified to investigate the role of social media towards political accountability.
Keywords: Democracy, Freedom Of Expression, Pakistan, Political Accountability, Social media