Political parties are going all out to woo support for the May 7th elections through social media.
Rallies and door to door campaigns are still held, but today the new tool is social media.
Social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube have emerged as important electoral campaigning tools.
The impact of social media campaigning was first evident, during the 2008 US elections.
However, political analyst Shadrack Gutto has warned that online following may not necessarily translate into success at the polls:
“You can’t simply say because people are connected through Twitter, Facebook and so on, that those connected automatically translate into actual votes. Some of those people who are connected on Twitter and other social media sites are registered to vote and if they are, are they going to make time to go and vote even though it will be a public holiday, but some of them may not be able to vote,” adds Gutto.
Wednesday marks 11 years since the Independent Democrats was formed in 2002
Meanwhile, Independent Democrats (ID) leader Patricia De Lille says the ID will continue to be registered with the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC) until after the 2014 election.
Wednesday marks 11 years since the Independent Democrats was formed in 2002.
The party has now been absorbed into the Democratic Alliance (DA), but De Lille says it will only cease to exist after the May 7th elections.
She says she remains ID leader until after the May polls. “The ID held a national executive committee meeting about three months ago, where we had agreed as the national executive that the name of the Independent Democrats will continue to be registered at the IEC. This was to ensure that nobody goes and uses the name and under that name participate in the elections. It will also give us some time to wind up the business, the assets and everything of the ID,” adds De Lille.
– By
