The Rising Power Of Social Media In The Politics Of Uganda

Extremely rigid and conservative Museveni is waking up to a real dilemma of how to handle the “Power of social media “gradually there is a shift in the balance of power,the influencing factor has arguably been the social media, the state has been adamant to embrace the applications of internet based media platforms to counter its opponents and therefore for a longtime the social media has been dominated by opposition figures and sympathizers. The state's ability to use violence has  been weakened, by power of the social media during Buganda riots and Walk to Walk protests the political activists faced the brunt of  violence from the government but with time we learnt our lessons and retreated to form stronger political voice by utilizing the social media where the political contestation is taking place in the new age .Over the same period, social media has become a fact of life for civil society organizations ,local actors, regular citizens, activists, nongovernmental organizations, telecommunications firms I mean it has influenced all spheres of society but most significantly it has been the single game changer in the field of Uganda politics

As it stands Museveni is visibly miles off from his longtime friend and party CO founder John Patrick Amama Mbabazi (JPAM) in the application of the new age internet technology from his competitors JPAM launched his campaign notice without inviting a media house. . Ugandans may have noticed of recent Museveni has taken the trend of disseminating information through the social media to counter his opponents but unknown to him. Museveni has been making a public spectacle of himself through the same social media, every attempt he has tried to counter the onslaught of his personality on the social media it has in turn been used to hemorrhage him further by the public. Museveni realize in the digital era there must be no room for mistakes, world politicians have styled up quickly after learning the negative impact of making a political gaffs in this digital age, campaigns have been lost on sheepish mistakes by politicians and the clued ones have learnt to take nothing for granted.

Credit to his party rival John Patrick Amama Mbabazi JPAM who has embraced the social media platform to communicate to his base and he retreated for a long study and often kept the nation guessing through his posts on social media and finally when he announced his intention it simply went viral on the social media. JPAM has trended all social media platforms talk of YouTube, Twitter, Whatsapp, Face book you will not miss date with something with JPAM.

But overall Dr. Kizza Besigye is the most cherished face of opposition politics has been interacting on social media over the past years, has aggressively used social media has a coordinating tool for nearly all of the political protests to effect change against the authoritarian governments with alarming level of success

Therefore because Museveni finds himself in the back of the pack he has become a late entrant in the field of new age internet technology, the government tried to use Uganda Communication Commission (UCC) to restrict the use of social media. While he has succeeded to censoring the main media houses he has failed to restrict to internet freedom, But if ever the government were to shut down Internet access or ban cell phones, it would risk radicalizing otherwise pro-regime citizens or harming the economy this is creating additional dilemma for Museveni no modern economy can function without working phones and so its ability to shut down communications over large areas or long periods is constrained.

  

In desperation he has ordered a security clamp down of notable social media activist who have been relentlessly hammering the points home against his tired and disguised authoritarian regime, this explains why in the span of one week 3 social media activist have been arrested by the state security one  of such is Robert Shaka. He is being alleged to be a one TVO Tom Voltaire Okwalinga commonly known as TVO who has been leaking top government secrets. The power of social media is exposing authoritarianism in Museveni, authoritarian governments historically are known to stifle communication among their citizens because they fear, correctly, that a better-coordinated populace would constrain their ability to act without oversight as social media usage Increases Avenue of sharing awareness by propagating messages through social networks.

In the same week the social media frenzy went on high gear in Uganda to pressurize the government to release the social media activist/critics in a coordinated massive and rapid response use of social media tools  from text messaging, e-mail, photo sharing, social networking, and the like is just tools that was used to secure their release.

Today as a political activist, I celebrate with the rest of the fraternity who have labored against all odds in face of all risk to spread valuable information to the masses, Museveni is soon becoming a thing of the past he has sensed it that is why there is widespread undocumented crackdown on social media critics.